


Pointe of no Return

by Hakuryen



Series: First Positions [1]
Category: Mozart l'Opéra Rock - Mozart/Baguian & Guirao
Genre: Alternate Universe - Ballet, Ballet AU, Fluff, Found Family, M/M, POV Alternating, Rating for one chapter, Slow burn? Don't know her, Social Media AU in disguise, Unreliable Narrator, Wolfgang and Nannerl being the best siblings, bad coping with remnants of said injury, mention of past injury
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-10-07
Updated: 2019-06-26
Packaged: 2019-07-27 15:35:00
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 14
Words: 57,759
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16222064
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Hakuryen/pseuds/Hakuryen
Summary: Transfixed, Salieri watched.The blond was beautiful. His movement was graceful yet strong, and this was only a short orchestrated sequence, not even a full performance. How would he fare being up on the stage, feeding on all the energy it held - or, better yet, what would he look like doing an improvised performance that relied on his emotions only? Salieri could not keep his eyes off him.Finally freed from their gilded cages in the Salzburg Ballet Company, Wolfgang and Nannerl set flight to Vienna, their dream of becoming principal dancers finally being fulfilled.But what awaits them is not only a new workplace - it's new problems, new heights in their lives, new friends, a newfamily.It's more than they could've ever dreamed of.





	1. Entrée

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Here it is, the AU I've been pestering everybody with for the past three months! 
> 
> Yes, the title is a totally cliché pun and kinda not fitting since the main characters don't dance with pointe shoes, but I still love it.  
> And yes, this first chapter is not really a literate masterpiece, but the first Harry Potter book wasn't either.
> 
> I will try to upload at least one chap per week, most likely either on Saturday or Sunday, and since I've already written everything up to chapter three, this schedule will definitely work out for two more weeks. We'll see what becomes of it afterwards.
> 
>  **Terms for this chapter:**  
>  Principal dancers - ballerinas and danseurs who are on top of the hierachial chain of dancers in a company. They are guaranteed to get the lead roles in ballet.  
> Soloists - ballerinas and danseurs who get, you guessed it, solo parts. They can also be understudies for the lead roles.  
> Corps de ballet - all the dancers who dance nameless roles without any solos. For example all the swans in Swan Lake.  
> Pirouette - a turn on one leg  
> En pointe - standing on top of the pointe shoes (the shoes that ballerinas wear)  
> Fourth position - one of the basic five positions of the feet in ballet, where the feet are facing into different positions and are set in front of each other in an angle
> 
> More notes at the bottom, but for now - Enjoy!

The Austrian landscape flew by him in a rush that wasn't too different from the turmoil inside of him. The coolness of the window against his forehead stood in stark contrast to the warmth inside this wagon, and the gentle clacking of the train trac ks below nursed him into a doze. Nannerl, who was sitting beside him, turned another page in her magazine. They hadn't talked since boarding the train, both of them being so occupied with the realisation that they were leaving behind their old life slowly setting in. Their family, their friends, the company that had been more home to them than their family house these past few years.

Vienna wasn't too far a move away from Salzburg - after all, Austria was a small country which they were not ready to leave yet, unlike some other ballerinas and danseurs who thought their career lay behind foreign borders - but it still was a big change for them, who had never before stood on their own feet. At first, their father had been reluctant to let them go their own ways. They had had stable positions in the Salzburg Ballet Company, which they entered immediately after graduating from its academy. However, their positions had been too stable. Neither of the siblings had felt like they were appreciated under Colloredo's rule in the company, and while they were thankful for being promoted to soloists there, neither Wolfgang nor Nannerl had believed that Colloredo would have let them ascend further. And while every contracted dancer in a company knew that one could spend years in one of the ranks and still never be promoted, nobody liked to be without the hope of ever reaching the next level.

So they had decided to start with a clean state. To leave behind the familiar and venture into new possibilities. Not alone, but with each other by their side.

They even had their own place now. No memory-ridden rooms in their parents' house, no other students they had to share a dorm room with. Just the two of them and their own space without any expectations besides their own.

Naturally, they hadn't just one day collectively made the decision to move into a new city without even having a paid position there. The both of them were quite active and popular on social media, where the head of the Vienna State Ballet had happened upon and taken a liking to them. An invitation to join his company as immediate principal dancers had quickly been forwarded to them and the offer was too good for them to reject. Neither of them could believe their luck. For somebody to watch and see talent in them, to invite them - _both_ Nannerl and Wolfgang! - into his company without even having to audition to join. Sure, their contract stood on wobbly legs and didn't yet reach farther than a year, but they'd do their best and beyond to be able to gain the most out of this.

The train moved into the next station and a man who loudly talked into his phone walked by them, which woke Wolfgang from his slight slumber with a start. The window was slightly fogged up from where he breathed on it, and judging from the look on Nannerl's face, he probably had a huge red splotch on the side of his face that he had slept on.

"I may or may not have taken a picture of you cuddling with that window instead of me , " Nannerl addressed him with a soft smile, softly pinched his cheek and went back to reading. He answered with a tired smile of his own before laying his head down on her shoulder this time and reading with her.

The rest of the two-and-a-half hour trip was spent in this calm manner of them slightly conversing while reading and looking out of the window. Like they were enjoying the calm before the storm that their life was sure to become now.

 

 

Setting foot into their flat felt liberating. They had already seen it before, of course, when they were looking for flats to move into a few months ago and then again when they had set everything up. But nothing could actually surpass the sudden awareness of this being your new home, your _first_ own home at that. It by far wasn't as big as their parents' house, but it had all they needed and more. It being close to their new company was just a bonus.

"Wolfie?" Nannerl's voice reached him from where she stood in the doorway to her room. "Do whatever you still need to do quickl y; we're supposed to be at the company in an hour, and I'd rather be early than late." Her reminder was followed by a lovely smile that he was quick to reciprocate before she walked back into the room and closed the door behind her. Probably to change. Which he should probably do too. It might not be the best first impression to walk up to their new supervisors in Bermuda shorts, sandals, and one of the bright graphic tees he liked to wear. Giddily – his sister would probably bully him for literally sk _ ipping -  _ he made his way over to his room and took everything in. His room was the smallest in their flat. Both him and Nannerl had thought it best to use the biggest room as their main living space, and then he had volunteered to give Nannerl the second biggest room. But this one was still his. The garishly painted walls, bright furniture, and the usual mess that he had practically copy-pasted to the nines.

They hadn't yet unpacked everything, so finding the right outfit amidst all the boxes still standing around was quite the task. In the end, he opted out for the first decent items he found and quickly put them on, fueled by the giddy impatience that he could practically feel radiating from Nannerl and through the thin walls.

Today was a day of many firsts. The first time they crossed the threshold of this flat and were finally able to call it their home, the first day they'd see their new company in person. The first time they'd meet their new instructors and maybe even some other dancers. Their new second family.

Despite them getting lost - and quickly getting back on track, using the godsend that is Google Maps - they arrived with a good fifteen minutes to spare before they were supposed to meet up with Rosenberg and Cavalieri, who they had been told would be their new instructors. The receptionist in the front hall was busy talking on an old school phone, and after he spared them a glance when they pushed through the heavy front door he immediately did a double take which was followed by a bright smile. It seemed like he tried to shake off the person he was talking to as quickly as possible while the siblings looked around and waited patiently.

Finally, he put the phone back on its station and waved them nearer to give them an even bigger smile.

"You're the Mozart siblings, right?" he asked with great enthusiasm. "I watched clips of some of your performances. Just bravo! You were much better than the principal dancers, in my opinion." The bright grin on his lips didn't waver even as they just stood there in stunned silence. Sure, they were somewhat popular on social media, but so far nobody had actually spoken to them with such reverence. In the world of ballet, you were much more likely to be hit with sharp critique and constant pressure to improve.

The siblings were quick to recover from the surprise, answeringwith their own smiles and beginning to make small talk with the receptionist, who made sure to let them in on some of the basic facts and gossip of the company.

"The people who'll instruct you are Mr Rosenberg and Missus Cavalieri," he continued after he had given them a quick verbal run-through of the building. "They're the main ballet master and mistress of the company and they can be very strict, but I'm sure that's the case for all instructors. They only want the best for the company and dancers. Well, at least I'm sure Missus Cavalieri does. You'll definitely stand in her good graces, but Mr Rosenberg has got his favourites. Mr Salieri and Mrs Weber are currently on the top of that list; they're basically the first principal dancers, even though this company doesn't subdivide the rank s like that." His fast-paced rambling was not difficult to keep up with for them, but the amount of sudden influx of information became too much after just a few moments of conversation. However, this was a welcome change. The receptionist of their old company was about as old as the art of ballet itself, and her favourite pastime consisted of harassing the dancers who did no more than a little mistake.

Instead of already looking around a little, like they had originally planned, they spent the rest of the time until they were supposed to meet up with said instructors chatting with the enthusiastic man. Exactly when the clock struck the full hour, the big double door they had been told led to the main corridor opened and revealed two figures. The first who came into the room and immediately set his eyes on them was a stick thin man with grey hair that was bound into a low ponytail. His hawk-like nose was accentuated by a small pair of glasses, which he was looking over. Mozart could already feel judgement radiating from his gaze. Behind him stood a beautiful woman with her hair set into a high bun. She actually had put on a smile and was already waving them over. Nannerl and he quickly said bye to the receptionist to shake their instructors' hands and introduce themselves properly.

"We already know who you are," Rosenberg interrupted them before they could do the latter. "This lovely lady right here is Mrs Cavalieri and my name is Rosenberg. Just because you got a free pass from the boss doesn't mean we'll make it easy for you. Now come, the trials are supposed to start in a few minutes and it wouldn't be acceptable to be late." He gave them another once-over before curtly nodding and turning back to walk through the big door again. They didn't follow immediately, however, as Mrs Cavalieri spoke to them first.

"Don't min d him, toda y has been stressful. We've already seen a few dozen applicants for the lower ranks and the audition we're about to have is the last of today. It's nice to have you." Her tone wasn't exactly soft, but it was still melodic and welcoming. Mozart could already feel that she was somebody he'd enjoy working with.

After, they began trailing after Rosenberg. The corridor was vast but plain, and its walls were partly lined with wide windows through which you could see into classes that were being held. A lot of rooms were actually currently occupied, be it by ballet masters or mistresses who were instructing a big group of corps de ballet and apprentices or by single dancers and pairs who didn't mind possibly being watched while practising. There were also some doors that led to rooms without windows facing the corridor, and Wolfgang assumed that those were probably practice rooms too.

The corridor itself was mostly empty from other people, the few they met on the way were either staff or dancers who were walking back to practice after a short break. The latter group paused when the instructors, Nannerl, and he came closer to give Cavalieri and Rosenberg deep, polite nods  before continuing to walk. Rosenberg and Cavalieri led them down another few similar corridors until they arrived in a small hall where a group of about a dozen ballerinas was already waiting.

"Good afternoon, ladies. Thank you for coming. The audition will commence in a moment; I hope you made sure that you're ready and warmed up. Do not forget to put on your pointe shoes and to pin the number shields you received clearly visible to your clothes," Cavalieri told them in a practised manner that clearly stressed how often she had already said the same thing today. "If there are any questions, please ask them now."

They stood in silence for a few moments before Rosenberg decided that was sufficient and held open the door for Cavalieri and Nannerl, but not for Wolfgang. The room they were in now was spacious, with a pale hardwood floor and big windows on the opposite wall of w here the door was placed, while the wall to their left was lined with borderless floor-to-ceiling windows, and all the walls had barres on them, as was typical ballet practice room fashion. The room itself was em pty save for a row of tables and chairs on the wall opposing the mirrored one, and an upright piano in the corner behind those tables. Cavalieri and Rosenberg sat down on the chairs in the middle of the tables, and he and Nannerl chose to sit on the two chairs to Cavalieri's right, which placed them close to the windows and the piano.

"Who are the other two chairs for?" Nannerl asked Cavalieri directly after sitting down.

Cavalieri again answered with a small smile. "We always keep those up and reserved for the head of this company and any possible guest he might wish to bring, which is most often either his secretary or his wife, should he choose to actually be present for once. He is also the one who scouted you and invited you to our company."

Right at that moment, the door opened and another man with jet black hair came in. He clutched a thick staple of paper in his arms, of which he let two-thirds fall on the table in front of Rosenberg and Cavalieri.

"Sorry I'm late," he said and didn't spare them another glance as he walked towards the piano, where he placed the remaining papers of which Mozart could now see that they were either sheet music or blank pieces with messy notes. The man turned around again and only just then seemed to notice Nannerl and him.

"Oh, where are my manners." His lips curled into a smile as he shook both of their hands. "My name is Lorenzo Da Ponte. I'm the one who backs the classes and practices of soloists and principal dancers with music, and I also help out in events like this. And you are?"

The presence of somebody in their age range helped Wolfgang relax more in this setting, and he could see that Nannerl felt the same.

"We are Maria and Wolfgang Mozart," Nannerl answered with one of her charming smiles. Wolfgang was about to say something too, but Rosenberg interrupted them by sharply clearing his throat.

"Da Ponte," he reprimanded him, "I believe it's time for us to start. Please go fetch the applicants." His gaze intently followed the pianist as said man quickly went out of the door to do as he was told. Lorenzo then came back with the group of girls, of which many were older than Nannerl and him, but few also younger.

Wolfgang could see how nervous some of them were and made sure to smile at them encouragingly. He'd probably shit his pants too, if he had to audition while such an impressive and accomplished woman like Cavalieri and such an intimidating old geezer like Rosenberg sat before him.

At first, Cavalieri told the girls to stand in a row, sorted by the number on the papers they had pinned to their clothing. She then stood up and looked at each girl intently while walking down the row. As she did that, Wolfgang counted that there were fourteen of them.

“Too wide hips,“ she suddenly spoke and pulled a girl forward by her bodysuit. The same happened to the girl at the end of the row. “And too short. The both of you, out. Thank you for coming.“

She didn't acknowledge them anymore as they made their way out with crestfallen faces and sent the rest of the girls to the barres and gave instructions on which positions to take in or what moves to do. After this sudden shock of those ballerinas being kicked out without even having a chance to go en pointe, it surprised Wolfgang that the things they had to now were pretty much mostly normal things they did in class to warm up, with them occasionally being asked to show their flexibility or to hold a position for a little while.

While she went around and looked at the dancers up close, Rosenberg examined them from where he sat and sometimes jotted down some notes on the papers. The sheets were their applications. Wolfgang could see that the separate bundles had pictures of the dancers clipped to them, but he couldn't read anything as he sat too far away.

"This will be enough for the barre," Cavalieri's voice suddenly boomed in contrast to the short instructions she had so far given. "Please stand in groups of four or five. I will now tell you a range of moves which you'll remember and execute together with your group."

What followed was a rapid-fire description of a short sequence, which she did not repeat.

"Group one." She pointed to where they should start. "Da Ponte will give the signal and play while you repeat what I just told you. Same goes for the groups after."

Cavalieri then moved back to her seat and nodded towards Lorenzo to show that he could begin.

"On three," he told them, waited a moment for them to right thems elves, and then counted down before starting to play.

The group of five did well, although Wolfgang's trained eye could see that they could've extended their arms or legs more in some positions, or that one of them was too stiff even when the short choreography called for a soft flow. In the end, however, when they were supposed to go into a _pirouette en pointe_ and then end in a _fourth position_ , one of the girls lost her balance and fell out of formation. Rosenberg immediately marked her page with an X before waving giving the next group a sign to get ready.

The same process repeated twice over, with some of the girls making minor mistakes while two completely forgot the rest of the routine about halfway through. For those two, Rosenberg didn't even make a cross, but rather laid them aside, face down. "Alright," he then said. "Please go outside for a few minutes. Miss Cavalieri and I will quickly talk about who we're already eliminating, call you in again to tell you our decision, and after, we'll proceed to the other group to go through the same procedure again."

The ballerinas went out the door.

"Those two are out," Rosenberg immediately said and held up the two profiles he laid down on the side. Cavalieri didn't react, she just leafed through the other bundles.

"I really liked numbers 611 and 613," she mumbled and handed those to Rosenberg, who had a look at them too. "And I'd also eliminate numbers 603, 605 through 609 and 612." She handed their profiles over too and again, Rosenberg looked through them. Most of them went on the staple of the ones he had already ruled out, except for one.

"I'd still give her a chance. Regarding the others, I agree."

And that was about it. Neither did they talk more about their reasons, nor did they ask Wolfgang and Nannerl about their opinions. It seemed like they were a well-attuned pair who trusted each other's judgement. This whole elimination process only took a few minutes - which was really quite the breeze, contrary to many other auditions. After the entrance exams for the ballet academy Wolfgang and Nannerl had gone to, they had had to wait for their results for a whopping two hours.

The applicants got called back in and again lined up sorted by number.

"If I call your name," Rosenberg got straight to the point, "please step forward." He then proceeded in calling out the numbers of the ballerinas who'd get to show what they had prepared, until half of the group had taken a step forward.

"Congratulations. If you have stepped forward, you've advanced to the next task. The rest of you can get your things and leave the building," he told them in a matter-of-fact voice, without having looked up from his papers.

Wolfgang watched the ones who were not called trod out with disappointed faces and felt sympathy for them. The world of ballet was not all guns and roses, but it was still disheartening to see others be rejected. The rest of the dancers looked relieved.

"As this next task is not done in groups, we'd ask all of you to kindly go outside and wait till you're told to come in. All of you except for ... who's the lowest number? 601, please stay," Cavalieri then ordered the group, and they all waited for the girls to walk out and for Lorenzo to get ready. He enquired whether the girl was ready herself when he had finished that, and the second trial began. This time around, Cavalieri and Rosenberg only watched. No further notes were taken, as they probably didn't want to miss any second of the short performance. Mozart himself was watching like a hawk too and felt a pang inside his chest every time the girl executed something imperfectly or missed a beat, as such small things that would be invisible to the eyes of laymen would cost dancers their hea ds in these halls.

When she finished, the instructors put their heads together and whispered amongst themselves. The girl already looked crestfallen.

It took a moment or two for them to come to a conclusion.

"Thank you for coming, but we don't think you'd be suitable for a position of soloist or principal dancer in this company. However, if you'd like to apply to the corps de ballet, please come back at a later date of auditions." Even Cavalieri's rejection sounded charming.

After the girl had left with the instructions to send in the next girl, Rosenberg burst.

"How did she even get to the position of solo ist? I'm stu mped. Which imbecile looked at such a performance and thought it was good enough for main roles? I can't believe how decent she was in the former task." His upset was cold and he didn't look like he wanted an answer, and Mozart had to strain not to blurt out his feelings on the matter. This was his new boss, and it wouldn't do to cross him on his first day. Fuck it, he probably would give him a piece of his mind anyway, if it wasn't for Nannerl kicking him as a warning.

This process went on and two of the ballerinas even got asked to wait outside some more, since the company was only looking for one more soloist or principal dancer and they wanted to make their decision at the end, after they had seen all performances. Currently, they were waiting for the last girl to perform.

It didn't take long until she came in and stood before them, waiting for her signal to start. All the while, Rosenberg was leafing through her information sheet. Suddenly, he hummed.

"How curious," he broke the silence. "I didn't look at your name until just now. You don't happen to be related to Miss Aloysia Weber?"

Until then, Wolfgang had not paid much attention to the looks of the dancers and much rather concentrated on their technique. But this awakened his curiosity.

Mozart did indeed know who this Aloysia was, from when he researched the company after receiving the work offer. She was one of the principal dancers he would be working with. He had actually seen one of her performances too, as her looks had struck him so beautiful - just in the way that was desired by many in this world of ballet. Now that he was having a closer look at her presumed sister, he could se e a certain similarity in her face. The woman in front of them seemed to share Aloysia's feistiness too; however, she also exuded a certain gentle aura. She answered Rosenberg's question with a cha rming smile and a simple nod. Mozart already liked her.

"And how come we're only hearing about your existence now?" Rosenberg inquired further, his tone blasé as always.

"I can imagine my dear sister not liking to talk about her family much. I have been working under another company, but familial issues have forced me to move back to Vienna recently."

Her explanation seemed to suffice, as just a second later Rosenberg gave Da Ponte a sign that they could begin now.

And Mozart was blown away.

Her technique wasn't totally perfect, as was the case for any dancer, but the emotion she brought across twined around his heart and let it swing wildly inside his ribcage, a meagre excuse for a steady heartbeat. Naturally, she wasn't as good as Nannerl. But he could admit that his opinion on that was rather subjective as his sister had been his biggest idol since they first started taking lessons.

A last few staggering notes echoed through the room as her performance came to an end, followed by a deep bow she gave the instructors.

"Thank you, dear," Cavalieri smiled at her, "please go outside and join the other two. We'll discuss our decision and come back at you as soon as possible."

The nod the woman gave now was more sincere and happy, and Wolfgang could feel happiness for her seeping into him too.

"I want her," Cavalieri blurt out as soon as the ballerina had left the room. "I don't care about possible inter-company family drama. The emotion in her performance is exactly what we are looking for in our soloists and principal dancers, and the little imperfections she had in her technique is nothing we can't improve."

Rosenberg seemed to battle with himself, and like a vulture, Cavalieri came down on his weakened conviction.

"We can also just contract her on probation. So that if we decide that she isn't right for our company after all, we can still call one of the other two girls waiting outside." She threw another one of her dazzling smiles at him, which seemed to be the killing blow. Rosenberg sighed in exhaustion and they knew he had given in.

Wolfgang turned around and was met with Nannerl's and Lorenzo's excited expressions, which he could only imagine mirrored his own. He was so eager to start working here.

  
  


After they got home, they spent the rest of their day unpacking whilst chatting excitedly. They couldn't wait to meet the other dancers, but that was still a few days away as they would start at the beginning of the next week. As would the other girl that got into the company today. Nannerl and him had only belatedly realised that they didn't even catch her full name, and calling her Miss Weber just sounded wrong to Mozart's ears.

By the end of the day, the Mozart siblings found themselves facing each other sitting on one of the huge windowsills that the apartment had to offer, their feet entangled and hands wound around big cups of steaming cocoa as they watched the sun go down and the city lights slowly come to life. Mozart has never felt as content as he did in that moment, watching Nannerl slowly become illuminated by the white lights outside in the otherwise dark room. She herself was observing the cars and people moving by on the streets down below, lost deep in thought.

"Do you remember our first ballet  lesson?" His voice broke the silence. Them leaving their childhood home behind had brought up old memories of said childhood, and the warm comfort of having his sister close had his mind at ease.

"No, we basically got shoved to the barres as soon as we could somewhat stand on our own," she chuckled. Her soft gaze landed on him. He huffed in amusement.

"Yea, me neither. But I do remember the day you got your first pointe shoes. I was so jealous, suddenly you could just be so much taller and graceful than me. Not that you aren't already without the shoes, but - you know." He knew he was rambling; the sugary beverage in his hands had shot straight to his head and given his sugar-deprived system a thorough shock. Granted, he was not much more hyper than on a normal good day, but his current stuttering left nothing to be desired.

The sudden contact of warm hands cupping his cheeks and smushing them nearly scared him into letting his mug fall. He glared at his sister, the effect ruined by him surely looking like a hamster with its cheeks full right now, but his sister let go nevertheless.

"I know. Sexism. I would've let you keep practising in my pointe shoes if father hadn't caught us and locked them away after." She leaned back against the window again.

He did, too, and for a few moments, there was only silence.

"I'm glad you're here with me," he whispered eventually, and when Nannerl’s hand reached for him, he took it.

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I forgot to mention this in the notes at the beginning, but I've never danced ballet and thus all my knowledge comes from the internet and might be wrongly applied in 50% of the cases. When I use ballet terms in a chapter - which I'll definitely do, trust me - I will always explain them in the headnotes, and should I miss one then please tell me so.  
> I'll definitely use video material as inspiration/reference sometimes, and if I do that I'll post the link for it in the footnotes, with a comment on what I used from it and where.  
> Also, every company handles it's hierarchy differently and in my AU Rosenberg & Cavalieri really hold the weight of the company on their shoulders, since they're acting as both Ballet Master/Mistress and Artistic Directors. This means that they both teach and choose who gets accepted into the company and who doesn't.  
> 


	2. Plié

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Ayeeee the next chapter! And I'm SO excited to show it to you!!!
> 
> Note: In my AU, the dancers have to go to "class" at every workday morning. This doesn't mean that they're still students that are being taught, it's just a term for the communial morning training.
> 
>  **Terms for this chapter:**  
>  En pointe - standing on top of the pointe shoes (the shoes that ballerinas wear)  
> Demi-Pointe - standing on the ball of your foot. Since no pointe shoes are required for this, male dancers can go en demi-pointe too  
> First Position - one of the basic five positions of the feet in ballet, where the heels are pressed against each other and the toes are pointing outwards (so the feet build a straight line)  
> Arabesque - a body position in which a dancer stands on one leg with the other leg extended, straight, behind the body  
> Demi-Plié - a movement done in any of the five positions, in which the dancer bends the knees halfway, keeping the heels securely on the ground

A sharp ringing noise erupted on the other side of the room and Wolfgang was pried away from his peaceful dreams. He groaned in agony. 

His hand reached out to where his phone normally lay, to stop this abysmal annoying sound and maybe doze on a bit longer in the soft sunlight that kissed his back.  
But it was all useless. Only when his hands didn't hit anything for quite a while did he realise that the sound was actually coming from the other side of the room. He half-heartedly leaned up a little and glared at it from where the alarm was still blaring on. And he kept staring at it. Until it stopped on its own, presumably in snooze-mode for the next ten or so minutes.  
Without any preamble, his door opened and in came his sister, already dressed in some comfortable clothing.  
"Oh good," she said and pushed the door open a little further, "your alarm actually did its job for once. Up, up. We've only got two hours till our first class begins and I'm supposed to stop by the shoe-making department before that. Come eat so that you can help me with my hair after." Instead of immediately leaving his room, she walked over to him and bowed forwards. He half expected her to give him a hug or something similar, but instead she just tugged the little strand of hair on the side of his face down, which must've stuck out.  
"Good morning, Wolfie," she then belatedly said to him. "I hope you didn't stay up too late and actually got some good rest in. Are you as excited as I am?"  
The reminder of what this day would bring with it immediately brightened him up. So much actually that he couldn't contain the sudden burst of energy and sprung out of his bed. "It's our first day in the company! I can't wait to meet everyone, do you think they will like us? Of course they will, we're so charming - and will both Rosenberg and Cavalieri instruct us? We should get there early, maybe the receptionist can show us the way. I really don't want-" While he was rambling, he had begun to follow his sister into the kitchen where she promptly interrupted his talking by shoving a piece of toast into his mouth. It was already toasted and had some jam on it, so Nannerl must have been up for way longer than he had and prepared breakfast before coming into his room.  
"We can't say that Wolfie, and not everybody can get along with everyone. I'm sure we'll find some friends and as long as the others are civil with us, I don't care," she answered his first question whilst beginning to eat herself.  
Their breakfast went by with them chatting about what the day held for them and what they had already experienced. As soon as they had finished eating, Mozart began helping his sister with putting her hair into a messy bun.  
"Alright, can we go now?" He then asked once he was finished with that. Nannerl gave him an amused smile.  
"Are you sure you want to?"  
"Why wouldn't I be?"  
Her answer merely consisted of letting her eyes wander down his body, and his gaze followed hers because why would they-  
Oh.  
He still had his pyjamas on. 

  
~*~

  
  
The air around him was cool, yet Salieri himself was already running hot. Nobody else was in the practice room just yet - why would they, after all class would only begin in over an hour. He himself tended to always be a bit early, but he never set foot into the hall over thirty minutes before it began. Today was an exception, though. Today was the first time in a year that he had entered the building with the intention to dance. He knew he had nothing to worry about; he had a set contract, all the other dancers knew him already and nobody was informed of the real reason he had been gone for so long. Maybe that was why he was still feeling an inkling of worry in the back of his mind. For all he knew, they could either think he had familial problems or that he had gotten a suspension for doing drugs or something equally ridiculous. For all he knew, they could be talking behind his back. Salieri was one of the few front faces of Vienna's biggest ballet company; it was only natural that there would be envious gossiping behind his back. He expected no less and had hardened his mind to the fact years ago. Nevertheless, being away from the world of ballet for a year had made him weak. For him to grow strong again, he would need to give his all, to throw himself into the classes and practices to catch up to everything he had missed, to not show his peers that if they wanted to take him down, now would be the time.  
So far, he had only been walking around on the hardwood floor to re-familiarise himself with the hall that was most often used for their morning classes. Now that the other dancers would soon begin trickling in, he should start on his warm-up. Or rather, his getting back into the swing of things, as he was already feeling way too warm.  
The motions that once came to him like breathing felt weird in his bones and he had to grit his teeth through a few of them. Sure, he had occasionally repeated some of them in his year away, but his training had mostly consisted of physiotherapy and him sneaking in runs he should not have had.  
After a few minutes of stretching and light warm-up exercises, the heavy door to the room suddenly opened. His head shot up.  
"Antonio!" he heard before he saw who was calling him. The voice already betrayed who was talking before he could see her raven black hair and lithe form.  
"Where have you been so long? Never mind - no matter where you were, you didn't have to drop off the world completely. You could've at least sent a message!“ Aloysia complained loudly and stumped over to him. Between her being a ballerina and another big face of the company, he didn't feel any competitiveness with her. That and her personality being a good match to his made him actually like her. If he were to think of his peers as friends, she might even be his best. Nethertheless, he didn't feel much guilt for not letting her in on what had happened.  
"Good morning to you, too," he told her in his blasé voice and looked back down where he was currently stretching his legs, using his theraband. She huffed.  
"Morning, asshole. Now tell me what happened." She then gracefully sat down beside him and joined him in his warm-up.  
"Stuff."  
He didn't usually avoid answering, and he was glad that on the few occasions that he chose not to, Aloysia was a decent enough person to not push him. Instead, she guided their conversation into more pleasant topics, like what big things he had missed over the past year and what the current company gossip was.  
"We're also getting a few new dancers. Two of them were actually quite popular in Salzburg. Hang on, I googled them and found their social media."  
She then paused in her warming up and took out her phone, her perfectly manicured fingers dancing over the screen. After just a second of searching, she procured an Instagram page going under the name 'Nannerl.Mozart'. Salieri didn't care to read her description and idly began scrolling down the page. He paid the first few posts in her feed, which merely showed some pictures of Vienna and food, no mind and just scrolled by them until he inevitably stopped at a picture that finally caught his attention. It obviously didn't depict this "Nannerl" but a blond man who seemed to be sitting in a train, sleeping, with his cheek being pressed against the window. It shouldn't be attractive, but Salieri could feel his cheeks heating up. He didn't even try to read the comment underneath before promptly locking the phone again and letting it drop back into Aloysia's lap.  
It was probably this Nannerl's boyfriend. He shouldn't pay him any attention in the first place.  
"He's cute, isn't he? That's her brother, he'll also be joining us in the company," Aloysia immediately proved him wrong. "If I wasn't engaged, I would try to get a piece of that."  
He hummed instead of giving her an answer and simply resumed his warm-up, hoping for class to begin soon and yet not at the same time.  
Thankfully, other dancers also began trailing in, of whom he only didn't know one or two. Rosenberg appeared about fifteen minutes before the practice was supposed to begin and gave Salieri a curt nod when he saw him. His instructor had kept tabs on him in his year of absence, being one of the few people who actually knew of the reason for it, but Salieri knew that no excuses would be given. Neither from him, nor Rosenberg.  
Shortly after him, the pianist Da Ponte and three other people entered the room. Salieri recognised two of them as "Nannerl" and her brother, but before he could pay them (or the brother's cute and flattering clothing, which he would totally deny if asked) any more attention, Aloysia pulled it onto her. She had suddenly sprung up when the small group walked through the door.  
"You!", she shouted, directed at the third person. "What are you doing here?!"  
Before the blonde stranger could answer, Rosenberg interrupted them. "Mrs Weber, can you and your sister please discuss personal matters on your own and in your free time?" His sharp voice cut through the thick, sudden silence of the room.  
Nobody ever wanted to argue with the strict instructor, not even Aloysia or Salieri himself, so everybody went back to their personal warm-ups before class began.  
"Class," he said as soon as the clock struck ten. "From today on, we're going to have Mister and Miss Mozart and Miss Weber with us. On probation," he added as if it was an afterthought. "Your personal timetables will be updated and posted in the main hallway as usual after the casts for the ballets of the season have been worked out. For those of you who dance in still ongoing ballets from last season, please mind that the schedule for related rehearsals is still ongoing. Now get to the barres. Da Ponte, if you please."  
Soft rhythmic music filled the room and everybody got up to do as they were told.

It felt strange holding onto a barre after so long, but bringing his arms up properly and moving his feet into first position felt natural. When Rosenberg began belting out his instructions for the morning exercise in his melodic but sharp voice, Salieri was even more surprised to find how well his body reacted to it. Not even once did he falter when Rosenberg told them - _first position_ , in, out, in, out, keep going aaaand .. _demi-plié_ and change sides, in, out ... - and even though he was probably out of practice, he knew that his posture and tension were perfect. All his anxiousness was gone, washed down the drain by the stream of lovely music and instructions.  
So when Rosenberg told them to gather up in groups so that they could go through sequences, he stood there proud and ready.  
The sequences were nothing long or too strenuous. After all it would do nothing to have a dancer injure themselves, in a warm-up session much less. They were simply brushing up the basics.  
When it was his turn to go through the first sequence with two other male dancers, he did splendidly. He could see the approval in Rosenberg's eyes. And when Aloysia gave him a small smile after, he smiled back and let his eyes roam over the other dancers. There, his gaze landed on the male Mozart sibling, who already had his eyes laid on Salieri. Salieri almost took it as mockery, had the other man not smiled at him right after, before having to go through the sequence himself. Transfixed, Salieri watched.  
The blond was beautiful. His movement was graceful yet strong, and this was only a short orchestrated sequence, not even a full performance. How would he fare being up on the stage, feeding on all the energy it held - or, better yet, what would he look like doing an improvised performance that relied on his emotions only? He had a very charming aura, and Salieri could not keep his eyes off him. Not even when the sequence ended and Rosenberg began explaining the next one. Not even when Mozart reciprocated his gaze again. Salieri really hoped he wasn't blushing.  
This wouldn't do. Mozart obviously was competition and even if the blond was interested in men, and in men like Salieri especially, he didn't have time for any fairy tale romance. Not even in his dreams.  
So he forced his eyes off Mozart and concentrated on the group who had just begun performing the same sequence. A simple step sequence, interluded by some small jumps and ending in an  arabesque.  
"You!" Rosenberg belted at one of the dancers. "You call that an _arabesque_? It's as if you've learned nothing. Salieri, come here."  
Suddenly being mentioned made Salieri apprehensive. Nevertheless, he did as he was told and stood beside Rosenberg, his back ramrod straight in anticipation and pride.  
"Salieri, do an _arabesque_ , no pointe," Rosenberg instructed brusquely. That, Salieri could do with ease.  
He didn't even think twice about it and slightly moved his standing leg - which was coincidentally also the one he had gotten hurt on - forward so that he could propel his other leg backwards into a perfect arabesque, while simultaneously lifting his left arm in front of him and the right one to the side.  
Despite having been gone for so long and having so many eyes on him, Salieri didn't actually feel nervous about this; body-control was his forte, and he was known for his perfection in holding poses, amongst other things. It didn't even bother him that he had to hold it for quite a while as Rosenberg pointed out how an _arabesque_ should look on Salieri and what the other dancer should improve.  
"See this?" Rosenberg added. "Salieri hasn't properly danced in a year and he can still hold the pose so well. What's your excuse?"  
When the other dancer couldn't answer, Rosenberg turned around to Salieri again.  
"Go into a _plié_ with your standing leg," he told him, as if to prove a point to the other dancer.  
Salieri did exactly that, which was when he ran into trouble for the first time that day. His left knee, the one he had injured, began to hurt as he had to hold the new, bended position. What began as a small itch quickly grew into a stinging pain hat he could only power through with a clenched jaw and pure willpower alone. He hurt so much that he couldn't even understand what Rosenberg was now telling the other dancers, and Rosenberg had to tap him on the back for him to understand that he could let the arabesque fall.  
Salieri paid mind not to show his relief at that, but Rosenberg was still giving him a stern gaze. As he walked back to the other dancers, though, he could thankfully see that none of them had seemed to notice.  
The rest of the practice flew by with Salieri's mind in a hassle; his knee didn't stop hurting even after he had left the strenuous pose and so he put all his focus on executing everything perfectly despite his handicap, not even once glancing in the direction of the company's newcomers. Thankfully, Rosenberg didn't ask him to demonstrate something again. He didn't pay him much mind at all, as a matter of fact, which seemed worse in Salieri's eyes. After all, this could only be the calm before the storm, and soon he would be consumed by his instructor's wrath.  
The end of the practice came both quicker and slower than Salieri would have liked, and he just wanted to slip out unnoticed and let the matter rest until forgotten, however-  
"Alright ladies and gentlemen," Rosenberg began his farewell, which the dancers were not to ignore. "Most of you have practices you need to go to, the rest is allowed to go home. Madame Cavalieri and I will converse about the lineup for new ballet productions and announce them tomorrow, or the day after that at the latest. Do not be late for any practices or classes. Dismissed."  
He didn't say anything about expecting Salieri to stay, but the way he stared at him spoke more than a thousand words. So, as the others trickled out of the room, Salieri took his sweet time in packing together his things and taking off his leather ballet shoes. Only when everyone, Da Ponte included, had walked out of the room did Salieri walk over to Rosenberg, shoulders squared and looking him in the eyes.  
His instructor stared back, arms crossed in front of him and one leg cocked to the side in obvious displeasure. A few seconds went by, and Salieri grew nervous. Only then did Rosenberg begin to talk.  
"Salieri," he began calmly, which didn't settle his uneasiness. "What the fuck do you think you are doing?"  
"I-"  
"No," Rosenberg interrupted. "You aren't thinking, never did. That's what's happened here. First you go and catch a major injury on a goddamn easy jump and then you just - what did the doctors say, hm? Have you been going to the physiotherapy?"  
Salieri nods sharply and crosses his own arms behind his back.  
"And what else - no taxing activity outside of observed therapy? Did you heed that?"  
"Yes, I did." A lie. He had been getting better, and he could no longer stand being perched up inside his flat, wasting away while his competitors were flourishing.  
"Then why the fuck did you mess up today." Rosenberg's rage was cold, but his eyes spoke of inferno, and he burned holes into Salieri's chest by jabbing his forefinger into it a few times, before escalating that into a light shove when Salieri didn't budge.  
"If you did everything they told you to, you should not have trouble dancing. Should have not been a whining little weakling ass _bitch_ about this."  
Salieri didn't even try correcting him; he had not whined at all. He had simply endured, but Rosenberg had noticed nevertheless. Then, Rosenberg moved his turned-red face out of his personal bubble again and put effort into schooling his features.  
"You know you're one of my favourites Salieri, you really are. But if you keep fucking up, I'll have to put you in serious timeout again. Forever, if I must." He waited a bit and when Salieri didn't answer, kept on talking. "I'll reduce the workload for this season to the bare minimum for you, to lessen the stress on your leg and to still give the company reason to pay you. I will arrange for more physiotherapy for you so that you can stay fit, under supervision. I don't want you to put any more unnecessary strain on that knee of yours. Do not fuck this up, alright? You won't only fuck up your career with this, but also taint my reputation."  
Then, he laid a hand on Salieri's shoulder and squeezed it fondly, as if he had given him well-meant advice, before leaving the room.  
Salieri was alone again.  
Until he entered the changing room and made sure that everyone else had left, Salieri and his emotions were trapped inside his mind. His gaze fell on the knee bandage he had been prescribed to wear for practicing, but didn't. Then, all of that exploded and he let it out on one of the lockers. It barely hurt, and neither did the metal door take damage - its clanging when hitting the locker body was merely mildly satisfying. So Salieri redirected his next punch to the wall beside it. That for sure wouldn't budge, but at least the dull ache in his knuckles gave him distraction from this ... frustrated nothingness that Rosenberg's scolding had pushed onto him. So he hit it again. And again. Until his hand was showing redness and he feared soiling the white paint. By then, the frustration had ebbed away and his mind yielded to the nothingness.

  
  
~*~

  
  
When he got home that night, his state of mind still hadn't changed, even though he had spent hours walking and sitting, listening to the city around him. He tried so hard for perfection, but it seemed it was all for naught.  
He was restless, sleep was out of the question, and he did not think that he would be concentrated enough to read one of the many books he owned.  
So instead, he looked up the social media of the siblings and sought out videos of the other male displaying his graceful dancing.  
He spent hours staring at the screen.

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Welp, that just happened!
> 
>  **Reference/Inspiration I used for this:**  
>  Pay attention to the instructor in this. Her rhythmic way of instructing is kinda what I imagine Rosenberg's is like. Just, yknow, more Rosenberg-ey.
> 
> Please tell me how you liked it, and come chat with me on Tumblr or Twitter!


	3. Tour en l'air

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hey guys!  
> Just to ward off confusion for this chapter:  
> -I've named the innkeeper/clown "Hannes Krüger". Hannes as a normal version for the name Hans or Johannes, and Krüger from the German word "Krug" (=jug/pitcher)  
> -This chapter has got 3 POVs. The first two play on the same day as chapter 2, and the last one plays on the day after
> 
> **Terms for this chapter:**  
>  Plié - the dancer bends the knee(s), keeping the heel(s) securely on the ground  
> Battement Tendus - Gradually extending the working leg to the front, side, or back, passing from flat to demi-pointe to pointe  
> Developpé - unfolding of the free leg into the air  
> Pirouette en pointe - a non-traveling turn on one leg, of one or more rotations, on the tip of pointe shoes  
> Port de bras - arm movements  
> Arabesque en demi-pointe - dancer stands on the ball of one foot with the other leg extended, straigt, behind the body  
> Pas de trois - dance by three dancers  
> Sissonne - jump done from two feet to one foot  
> Entrechat - the dancer jumps into the air and rapidly crosses the legs before and behind  
> Tour en l'air - turn in the air

Neither he nor Nannerl had anticipated just how well their first day would go by. Sure, they hadn't expected to be met with ire by every other dancer, but to receive such a warm welcome on their first day had been surprising too.

Wolfgang sadly didn't know how Nannerl fared after they had parted ways in front of the changing rooms, but it seemed to have gone well as she came out chatting with a group of other ballerinas, the other new principal dancer among them.

Wolfgang himself had already introduced himself to the other danseurs that were in the changing room and been greeted enthusiastically – his shoulder still hurt from the few well-meant slaps it had received – before he left the room to wait for his sister.

"Hello!" he greeted her and everyone around her when they came out.

"I'm Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart, pleasure to meet you." He grinned at the strangers who were eyeing him with curiosity and received a few names in return. Then, he turned to the other new principal dancer who was currently holding on to his sister's elbow.

"I'm sorry, I couldn't catch your full name yesterday?"

The woman gave him a blinding smile in return.

"Hello, I'm Constanze Weber. I'm looking forward to dancing beside you."

"Likewise. Where did you dance before?" He asked, and added to it as an afterthought because he didn't want to be impolite, "We're from Salzburg!"

"Oh, I was a soloist in Graz and moved back here because my mother could need a few helping hands with the family business." She spoke in a pleasant voice, but something about it seemed off to him and her smile had a tight edge to it, so Wolfgang did what he thought was sensible and tried to cheer her up with happier things, to bring her normal bright smile back. Nannerl had silently witnessed all of this and supportingly jumped in into his storytelling, her hand a reassuring weight on Constanze's back. They were in the midst of retelling the story of painting all of Nannerl's pointe shoes blue with finger paint and putting glitter on them – much to their father's grudge and their mother's delight – when Lorenzo, the pianist, caught up to the three of them.

"Fancy seeing you here," he greeted them with one corner of his mouth curled up into a smile.

They didn't hesitate in including him in their conversation, yet the way to the practice room was short and they had to part ways from him ("He's only at the other side of the room, Wolfie, you don't have to say goodbye to him.") and to warm up as quickly as possible.

No matter how excited they were for their first day, class would always be the same. Having to concentrate on his form and the instructor (who, really, wasn't such a joy to pay attention to) sucked all the fun out of the beginning of class. The usual barre exercises – occasional _pliés_ , _battement tendus_ , and a few _developpés_ – had lost all appeal to Wolfgang after his second year of training when he was a child, and both then and now did he yearn for the warming up to be over and the real stuff to begin. When he was sure that Rosenberg wasn't looking, he let his gaze roam over the other dancers that he could see from his place. He knew a few of the women and nearly all the men, except for one. Sadly, this man had his place at the barre somewhere behind Wolfgang and so he had to wait until Rosenberg ordered them to turn around for the first time before he could lay his eyes on the stranger. His dark, neat ponytail whipped softly with the rhythmic instructions and his back muscles moved under the strain of various arm movements.

Where Wolfgang himself liked to infuse his motions with lazy fluidity and feeling, the stranger was almost stiff, as if his body and mind feared being anything but perfect.

Then, the instructor told them to turn again and he did so, sadly. Just a moment later, though, he cast a coy glance backwards in hopes of catching the mysterious stranger's eyes. Tall, dark and handsome however didn't even notice him, as he had his gaze glued to the back of the head of the person in front of him. So, Wolfgang looked forwards again and allowed a pout to form on his lips.

By the time the warm-up exercises were over, he was about ready to die of boredom. The only thing that must've kept him from falling asleep on the spot was Rosenberg's annoying voice.

"Alright ladies and gents, that was it for the barres today, please gather in groups of three or four, divided by ballerinas and danseurs."

Giddily, he already turned around to the dark-haired stranger to introduce himself and ask if he'd like to be on the same group, but found Hannes and Stephanie already standing before him.

"Would you mind if we team up, Wolfgang?" Hannes asked him, grinning, and clapping him on the back. Never one to pass on the opportunity to make new friends, he accepted. After all, the groups could have four people in them, so he could still ask the man – but when he turned around to him, said stranger had already migrated to another group.

Feeling slight disappointment, Wolfgang concentrated on the class again and already mentally prepared himself for the same kind of instructions he had heard when they just arrived in the company, rapid-fire and aplenty. The relaxing warm-up music, provided by Lorenzo, had changed to a more exciting and distinct tune, breathing life into what they had to dance and inspiring Wolfgang himself. He was actually eager for this part – after all, first impressions were important, and he had to give his to a whole room. To everyone but his sister, of course. At the thought of her, he also looked at her and reciprocated her fond smile with a wide, childish one.

Rosenberg pulled everyone's attention to himself again, then, and instead of the fast instructions Mozart had expected, short sequences were described in a moderate tempo, easy to remember and even easier to execute. The ladies were first, their instructions being different from the men's. Nannerl and Constanze were in the second group, their movements mirroring each other but yet ... as if they were tinted in different palettes. If he were objective, he'd say that they were equally beautiful. Being the subjective brother he was, though, he definitely liked Nannerl better. When she stepped out of the last element (a short _pirouette en pointe_ ) and walked over to him, he immediately pulled her into a hug and complimented her on how amazing she had looked.

Finally, it came around to the male groups, and tall, dark and handsome was directly in the first one. Watching him felt like being sucked into a tornado. The initial impact was stunning, breathtaking, mind-blowing; and once you got used to it, once you reached the middle, the eye of the storm, you felt an inexplicable calm. Nothing mattered, not the deafening chaos around you, nor that this wouldn't be lasting long. Just seeing the sun glow through the clouds up above.

Before he knew it, the sequence was over and the man went back to the crowd of onlookers, back to his friend – Constanze's sister, even smiling at her. And then he looked Wolfgang in the eyes, for the first time. Only when he slightly narrowed his eyes did Wolfgang notice that his usual smile had slipped off his face, so he reapplied it in hopes of appeasing the stranger and being in good graces with him. He was just about to wave at him when Hannes put his hand on Wolfgang's lower back to lead him towards the middle of the room; apparently it was their turn to dance.

He put his heart into it.

Admittedly, you could only do so much with such a short sequence of a few steps, the usual _port de bras,_ some little jumps and a short _arabesque_ _en demi-pointe_. Nevertheless he was happy with himself and before he sought out Rosenberg's or even Nannerl's approval, he found his gaze on the stranger again. Where his eyes were slightly narrowed before, they now looked comically wide on his otherwise blank face. This time, the other man took his eyes off him first, so Wolfgang figured he should also concentrate again. 

The next group was already performing, and Rosenberg was clearly dissatisfied with the execution of the  _arabesque_ . So much, in fact, that he called the guy who messed it up out on it. So much that he even asked somebody else to demonstrate it properly. The name was unfamiliar to Mozart, and he suddenly found himself in rapt attention when the stranger – no, Salieri – stepped forward and demonstrated an  _arabesque_ and then also went into  _plié_ with it. It was in fact perfect. Wolfgang knew his own  _arabesque_ looked very good and he could reach a good height and tension with it. Salieri, however, looked like a renaissance statue, a David of ballet, in his steadfastness and excellence. Even when he had to keep it up for more than a minute did he show no struggling, his breathing deep and his face schooled into a passive blankness. 

"See this?" Rosenberg had asked.  "Salieri hasn't properly danced in a year and he can still hold the pose so well. What's your excuse?" Interesting.

After a bit, the instructor let Salieri drop the pose and Wolfgang really wanted to give him a thumbs up, but the other man ignored him. In fact, he seemed to ignore everybody but Rosenberg.

Class came to an end, and Wolfgang found himself approached by Hannes again.

"Hey! What do you think about a little get-together? My father owns a pub that is close by and it would be a nice opportunity for us to get to know you and you us, since our schedules will be pretty much packed soon."   
Happy at the prospect of already being included so well, Wolfgang shot him a blinding smile.

"I'd be glad to! Can Nannerl and Constanze come too?"

"Oh, I thought that was already implied," he laughed. "Of course they can. The more the merrier. Stephanie will definitely come too, and whoever else feels up to it, this kinda stuff goes around fast in the changing rooms. We should probably ask Lorenzo too, now that I think about it."

The other man set out to do exactly that and Wolfgang himself made the brave decision to ask the stranger whether he'd like to come, too. But something made him hesitate.

Salieri and Rosenberg were exchanging a look, and Salieri was packing much slower than everybody else, stalling his exit from the room. It was most likely that Salieri simply had a practice session with Rosenberg after this, so it wouldn't do to ask him since he was probably busy anyways. Still, Wolfgang couldn't shake off his worry as he turned around to his sister and Constanze, to tell them about the offer that had been made to them.

 

~*~

 

Miss Cavalieri's heels clacked on the hard ground, echoing through the halls they were walking through. The classes and the practices of the day had just ended, and the two of them had met up to talk about the day's happenings.

"How has Salieri been faring on his first day back?" Cavalieri asked Rosenberg without even sparing him a glance. Rosenberg huffed and looked out of the windows they were walking by instead of into her face, crossing his arms behind his back.

"He did good in class, and took well to dancing properly again. However, I am concerned." A deep furrow grew between his brows. "Towards the end, I asked him to show one of the other dancers how to do a proper _arabesque_ and then to go into _plié_ while holding it. Honestly, it mostly really was for showing the other dancer how it should look, but I also did it to see how Salieri would do. You know how good he was with body control and that his standing leg's the one he got hurt on?"

At that point, he looked to Cavalieri again and saw that she was already looking at him, her face schooled into a pleasant blankness.

"As soon as he went into the _plié_ I could see that his knee is still giving him trouble, which it shouldn't. You know, I've kept up with the doctors. They said it would take six to nine months for it to be like new. It's been _twelve_."  
"And what did you do?"  
"I gave him a tongue-lashing." At the other instructor's unimpressed face, he huffed.

"What? I usually wouldn't do that with anybody just because they couldn't hold a high-balance pose for a few minutes. But Salieri is good at holding any pose for however long that is required of him, you know that. I suspect he didn't listen to the doctors' orders, and soft words will do shit for him. So I shat  _on_ him and threatened him. Maybe he will listen this time."

Cavalieri's exasperated humming at his vulgarity went ignored.

"He is your star pupil, you do what you think is right. Just do not mess this up," she continued when she reasoned that he wouldn't. "And how did the Mozart siblings do?"

At that, Rosenberg looked obviously disgruntled. "They are amazing, I kind of hate-love it. Who knew that the boss could make a good decision for once. I can see why they were so popular in the Salzburg area, it's a wonder they weren't discovered and recruited before this, truly."

"That's good, then. I don't see why you're so grumpy about this." Cavalieri actually smirked at him while speaking. "If they're so popular, we should take advantage of that and use it for PR."

"Which means?"

At this, Cavalieri suddenly halted in her steps and stood there in silence for a few seconds.

"I think we should only let them dance in one ballet this season. And maybe we should do the same for Salieri, so that he doesn't overwork himself and destroy that knee of his for good."

Rosenberg didn't like to admit it, but it sounded appealing for sure. They would also need to get their boss's permission for that, but the man gladly trusted them and only denied the fewest of requests. The other instructor took his silence as reluctance and continued in her explaining.

"If we put them in only one ballet they can put all their concentration into that and make it the best performance. New, popular faces dancing exclusively in only one ballet, their renditions heart-breaking? The public will eat it up. We should probably also take them for a popular ballet. Since it's not Nutcracker season I was thinking of Swan Lake?" Then began walking again, this time a bit slower.

"Okay," Rosenberg agreed, sighing. "But then Salieri should get the role of prince Siegfried."

"No. If we are going to use the siblings for PR, we should put  _them_ into the main roles."

"Salieri will literally go nuts if he's only allowed to dance in one ballet and gets one of the lesser roles. He needs some struggling."

"Let's give him the role of Benno or Rothbart in that case," Cavalieri suggested and placed her hand on his elbow placatingly. Rosenberg gave in.

"Benno, then. He has already danced Rothbart and although the role is fitting and familiar for him, I think he might take better to dancing a new role and challenging himself if he can't dance anything else. And regarding Rothbart … I'd say Krüger? He fits the role physically. Although, he did enjoy dancing the jester in past renditions … maybe we should ask him what he'd prefer. Or whether he'd like dual-roling."

"You do that, then. So Mister Mozart should be Siegfriend and I … would actually like to propose that we separate the roles for Odette and Odile this year." His incredulous gaze made her laugh.   
"Now, don't look at me like that. I know that it's a tradition to let Odette and Odile be portrayed by one and the same dancer, and I know that you're a sucker for traditions, but we both know that that also puts a lot of strain on a single woman."   
Rosenberg didn't even bother answering. Most of the time, they trusted each other's decisions; but this was ridiculous.

Not affected by his aversion, Cavalieri continued.   
"I would propose Miss Constanze Weber for the role of Odile and as for Odette … I was thinking about Miss Mozart."

Now it was Rosenberg himself who abruptly stopped walking, his face twisted in disbelief.

"You can't be serious! They're _siblings_!"

"And? Lovers have sometimes portrayed siblings and vice versa, it's not like it's something unheard of. And we're talking about _ballet_ , dear, it's not like they're going to kiss on stage. _Besides_ ," she stressed when she saw that Rosenberg had just opened his mouth to complain again. "That they're siblings might even be ideal. They've known each other all their lives, and danced together since they first set foot in an academy. They know each other in and out, no matter if you like it or not, and that will do wonders for their performance."

"You're right. _But_ ," Rosenberg gave in, "You already want Miss Mozart to dance in just one ballet. So why also split the Odette-Odile role? It's not like she has much to do otherwise."

"That's because I really want Miss Constanze Weber to dance Odile. She is both graceful and feisty, which is honestly perfect."  
"And what about her sister? She got to dance the part of Odette and Odile in the last few years, she won't be pleased about us choosing a different cast."  
"She should stop being so demanding, then. She is not the only good female dancer we've got in our company and at the end of the day it's our decision to make. She can dance Queen Mother for all I care and get the main role for another ballet."  
Another sigh wrung itself out of Rosenberg.

"Fine, have it your way then. Now, let's talk about the understudy and then get Joseph's approval..."

 

~*~

 

Salieri was feeling like shit. He had ended up spending most of the night watching videos of Mozart and the occasional one of 'Nannerl' too, and when he grew tired of it (not tired, much rather unable to further stuff his heart with emotions like that, lest it would burst) he even looked through their Instagrams. Without liking anything and making himself known, of course. And when his eyelids finally started feeling like lead, he had fallen into his bed, way past midnight. The circles under his eyes must have been as dark as the coffee he was desperately clutching in his cold hands. As dark as the thoughts that bounced through his head as he looked at the role assignments that had been hung out in the main hall.

He had been given One. Single. Role.

And it wasn't even the main role.

As he looked over the over ballet castings, he noticed that all the other dancers had been given the usual amount of roles. No, that was not the case. The Mozart siblings had also been given just one role each, and that in the same ballet as him. But they had gotten the main roles.

What were their instructors thinking?

He kept pondering as he made his way to the changing rooms. Was this a punishment for Salieri? Had Rosenberg done this intentionally to show him that his sudden lack in skill wouldn't stay without repercussions, especially if he wouldn't improve again? Sure, the man had told him that they would keep his workload low, but _this_ low? And not even the main role?   
And if he wanted Salieri to take it easy, why did he give him a new role? That of Benno no less, which was not at all an easygoing one. Although, Salieri could actually appreciate that as he had never danced Benno, who had a lively character which would give him the opportunity to polish his jumps and acting skills.

Salieri was so absorbed in his thoughts that he didn't even notice how bustling the men's changing room was, and how silent it suddenly got as he entered. After all, he was used to arriving when there was barely anybody else there. Only when his eyes wandered up from the ground and fell on the first familiar faces did he notice that most of them were clustered around Mozart, in varying states of undress, and suddenly looking at him in surprise. Or mockery. Or – whatever, Salieri was too tired for this nonsense. He let his bag fall to the bench in front of his usual locker, not saying anything, and took out his dance belt and leggings to go change in one of the toilet stalls. Unlike some of these other savages, he didn't like prancing around in his dance belt in normal day life, or changing into it in front of everyone else.

When he came out again, the usual chattering had been taken up again and a few jabs were even thrown at him.

("Where have you been for so long? We missed you, Salieri!" Gottlieb told him and pet his back.   
"You look tired, had a long night?", Krüger smirked at him directly after. He ignored them.)

Once he was back at his place, he swapped out his sweater for one of the tight and breathable t-shirts he preferred for practicing. Then, he scrambled up his normal clothing and -

And he hesitated. His gaze had fallen on his knee bandage.

Without any further stalling, he hid it between his other clothing and threw the bundle into his locker.

 

 

The morning's class went by and Salieri could barely remember anything about it. It was as if his body had acted on autopilot, ignoring everything but the instructions given. He didn't even know what snapped him out of it, but suddenly he was aware of himself again, doing cool-down stretches on the ground. Most of the other dancers had already left the practice room, probably to hurry to their next appointed training session, seeing as their timetables had suddenly filled up. Theirs, but not Salieri's. Since he wasn't even portraying the protagonist, he would not be the first to be taught by Rosenberg today. No, that honour probably fell to Mozart. His own session would be in the afternoon and it was barely late in the morning now, so he still had some time to laze around.

Suddenly, he saw someone standing beside him out of the corner of his eyes, so he looked up from his stretching position. Aloysia loomed over him, already finished and waiting for something.

"Come eat with me," she asked. Demanded.

"Don't you have something else to do?" he huffed his answer and looked back down again to concentrate on stretching.

"No, somebody else took my main role." If Salieri didn't know her better, she'd sound blasé about that to him. "Plus I actually like spending time with your jackass, for whatever reason, and you've been gone for a year without any heads-up. I'd like to catch up."

Already haven given in, Salieri stood up and quickly threw everything into his sports bag.  
"What did you have in mind?"

 

 

Salieri would never admit that he enjoyed the time he had with Aloysia on that day, but when the time came for him to meet up with Rosenberg – and for Aloysia to meet up with Cavalieri, as her and Salieri's schedule for Swan Lake practices seemed to overlap – he only made his way through the building with a sense of dread falling in on him. Rosenberg was already there when he arrived, which was no surprise, really, as the man had surely spent all day in this one room after class was over.

"I hope you're fine with lots of jumping, despite your knee?" The instructor asked without any preamble as soon as Salieri set foot in the practice room.

"Yes, I think so," Salieri was glad that he didn't have to lie this time. "I just have a problem with holding poses, especially if my leg is even slightly bended. Fast movements are fine."

Admitting such a thing hurt his pride, but this was only his instructor listening. If he could, he should be truthful, so that they can work out the best way.

"Perfect. You're not gonna have much trouble with your injury then, hopefully. We're gonna start out with the prologue, with extra care for the _pas de trois_ of course, and then work our way forwards. The ballerinas who you'll be dancing with for the _pas de trois_ have already danced these roles in past renditions, so they already know the choreography by heart. So we're going to take time for you to learn it too, before we actually let all three of you practice it together."

Salieri simply answered with a nod and positioned himself in the middle of the big practice room, already having warmed up before coming there.

What followed was two hours of him learning the choreography of the prologue. It was simple, really – the setting was that of a big ball, held for the celebration of prince Siegfried's birthday and coming-of-age. Siegfried himself is not the merriest, as he is concerned about his mother's expectations and him having to marry lovelessly, so Benno tries to cheer him up and breathe life into the celebration. Benno's solo was very jump-laden, as was fitting for his character, but it also exhausted Salieri quickly. He didn't mind jumps, they were just not his strong-point, but having to repeat the same jumping sequences over and over and _over_ would best anyone. Merely the calmer parts of the _pas de trois_ let him relax a little.

"We will definitely have to work on your stamina and accuracy with the jumps, Salieri," Rosenberg remarked. "But Rome wasn't build in a day, and this choreography is tiresome on the long run. So let's pack up for today and continue tomorrow, yes? Good work."

But his voice didn't at all sound satisfied. It held the usual flatness, which in itself wouldn't concern Salieri if he was any other dancer; but he was Rosenberg's favourite, his star-pupil, had been so since Salieri had began training under him when he was still a student all these years ago. He usually got something better out of Rosenberg, something _more_ , at least more than an emotionless 'Good work'.

Yet, he just swallowed his disappointment down and gave his instructor a polite nod. "Thank you."

He barely managed to remember to change and bring his sports bag before he had to flee from everything, down the hall, out of the building; and he didn't stop fleeing until his apartment door flew shut behind him and he was alone with himself and his thoughts again.

You never realise how lonely you are until it's the end of your day, your head is bursting and you've got nobody you would want to talk to. He spent hours like that, perched up in his own home like a convict waiting for his death sentence, restless but knowing that he couldn't do anything. Still – what had he read once? _'Do not go gentle into that good night; Rage, rage against the dying of the light.'_

Yes.

Salieri would not let the day go by unsatisfied in himself – he never had before, why should he start now. He'd either practice until he was happy with his progress or until his very body told him it was too much. How good was it then that most principal dancers in this company were given keys to the building and most practice rooms, so that they could practice at their own discretion.

So he changed into looser practice clothing – for once not caring about walking around the public in his dance belt – and packed his portable speaker from which he would be able to play the prologue music.

When he arrived at the company building, it was already evening; most people had already left the premises so there must've only been a few lingering souls left, Salieri being one of them. Thankfully, he didn't meet any of them.

He went through the backdoor, as only a few people were in possession of the key to the front hall, and sought out a practice room that was big enough for what he had planned and held no windows towards the halls. Not being alone in the building was one thing, but he didn't want for anyone to spy him practicing and to watch. As he hadn't bothered to bring everything he usually carried in his sports bag, he didn't have his usual warming up objects with him and therefore settled for a minimalist warm-up regime.

Then, he skipped the music to a part shortly before his solo would begin and positioned himself in the middle of the room again. The lovely tunes of _Allegro semplice, Presto_ reached his ears and soon flowed into _Moderato_ , his cue to start dancing.

He had to start out with shortly standing _en demi-pointe_ on one leg, his left one held high behind him and bent in a graceful arch, before he already had to walk back a few steps and launch into his first jump from this little of a run-up. Not only that, though, the choreography required for him to also hold his hands up high and to add extra movement in his legs, which resulted in his jump losing power and height. Then, he had to launch into the next step and another jump, and again, and again. Rinse, repeat. He ended up doing five jumps in just over a dozen seconds, already feeling exhausted, but he had to power through. Benno was lively, but his dancing should also look effortless and charming.

Next was a short pose, followed by a few _sissonne_ jumps and three slightly higher jumps, two of them being _entrechats_ and the third consisting of a _tour en l'air_. Without any time to rest, he repeated this short sequence. Only then, after he had already filled so many jumps with even more energy, did he get a short rest phase: a few moments of drawn out poses and a long pirouette, him showing off how fluid he was, before he came to the grand climax of his solo. Ten big outwards jumps, going around in a circle twice, ending with him falling to one knee in a pose of elation after having done another _tour en l'air_.

By the end of it, he felt the sweat running down his forehead and back, and barely managed to heave in the bursts of breath he so desperately needed.

This wouldn't do. He had to look effortless, as if it weren't big leaps but rather small jumps over puddles. And even then it wouldn't be enough – Salieri knew very well that he tended towards stiff perfection, and that the characteristic languidity and carefreeness of Benno would not come easily to him. First, he needed to build up stamina, then casual perfection.

So he did his solo again. And again. Once more.

He stayed for so long that the sun began flooding the room with its last dying light.

And the more he did it, the more the exhaustion built up, and the more he had trouble putting energy into each and every jump.

Until it came that he was about to engage the transition between the _tour en l'air_ into the final pose and he lost concentration. The knee he had to kneel on, the knee he had hurt a year ago to be exact, smashed against the hardwood floor and immediately, Salieri let himself fall to the side, clutching his leg towards his body, tears springing from his eyes.

Broken sobs broke out of him and he didn't even know if they were from the pain or from frustration. Resenting himself, he hit his injured knee, once, twice, feeling it pang even more.

And like this, Salieri remained there, the last breaths of the dying sun falling over him as he lay alone, crying.

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> ... :)
> 
> **Reference/Inspiration I used for this:**  
>  I used this as a reference to describe Salieri dancing Benno's solo. If you want to see the whole pas de trois, wind backwards a bit.   
> I also used that the link from chapter 2 isn't working, so I'll try to fix that!


	4. Pas de trois

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sorry this is so late, but life is kicking my ass lately.   
> I won't update again until I've finished writing both chapter 5 and 6, so depending on my motivation the next update might either come next weekend or even in over a month. We'll see, but please don't send me pushy comments, that'll only discourage me from writing.
> 
> **Terms for this chapter:**  
>  Pas de deux / pas de trois - choreography for two / three dancers  
> Odette/Odile - female protagonist of Swan Lake (Odette) and her bad counterpart & daughter of Rothbart (Odile). These roles are traditionally played by the same ballerina.  
> Bourne - there is an alternate version of Swan Lake, created by Matthew Bourne, in which all of the traditionally female parts (like the swans) are replaced by men

Nannerl and he were sitting on their living room windowsill again, this time with tea in their hands instead of hot chocolate. That had only been a treat for their first day in Vienna – something that Wolfgang would tell himself again later in the night, when his stomach would try to bully him into sneaking in another cup of the smooth beverage without Nannerl's knowledge. On the other hand, today had been their first day in the company, which was surely also treat-worthy, and-

"Don't even think about it," his sister interrupted his silent reverie. "I don't care about the calories since you burn as many as a whole herd of elephants anyway, but the sugar will literally have you bouncing against the ceiling all night long. And contrary to my bouncy ball of a brother, I need my sleep, which I will definitely not get if I hear you making cartwheels again."

Her tiredness had turned her chipperness into an impassive facade, but Wolfgang himself was feeling as lively as always. He pouted.

"How did you know?"  
"You were literally throwing metaphorical daggers at your tea. Or shooting laser beams at it with your eyes."

"That'd be so cool," he whispered into his cup and took a tiny sip. At least it was fruit tea. Their mother's herbal tea had always made him want to barf, which might've also been the cause for his aversion for tea, now that he thought about it.

"You don't look tired," his sister ignored this totally cool conversation topic. "Would you like to have some warm milk with honey instead? That will make you sleepier and god knows you should get enough of that on nights before practice."

"You know I am an adult that can care for himself?" He evaded indignantly.

"I know, but I also know that I can't trust you with cooking milk."  
"...that was literally once," he murmured and held his cup tighter, his face against the window turning sideways so that he could gaze into the night. The city lights looked like tiny lanterns on strings.

"Add a zero to that number and you might be closer to the truth." Nannerl looked at him with arched eyebrows and then stood up to walk over to the kitchen, presumably to prepare the milk. Wolfgang could still observe her through the doorway.

"What do you think about the other dancers?" he called out to her and felt a yawn slip through his lips.

"They're mostly really nice," she called back. "Rosenberg can suck my ass, though."  
The matter-of-fact way she said the last thing made Wolfgang snort into his next sip, which in turn made him spill over himself. Staring at the spill for a few seconds, he decided to just accept his fate and looked up again.

"I really like Constanze and Stephanie," Nannerl added when she saw that he'd not answer immediately.

"Me too. Hannes and Lorenzo too, they're really nice." He was about to add a comment about Salieri, but thinking about the fact that he knew that _Nannerl knew_ that he hadn't even spoken to him yet changed his mind. She'd tease him endlessly about having the hots on him. Which he didn't, thank you very much. He had functioning eyes and everyone in the class was very attractive – everyone _dancing_ in the class; god, even thinking about Rosenberg in such a context made him want to gorge his eyes out and bury them somewhere holy. Probably underneath the pope's shit-house or something. 

He didn't even know why he was so obsessed with tall, dark and handsome (a nickname that he'd never leave his head, lest Nannerl tease him endlessly with it). It probably was the mystery around him – all the other danseurs were so approachable, and Salieri was the only one he hadn't even talked to yet. Then there was the things that Hannes had told them in the pub just this day, when he had filled them in on all the need-to-know company knowledge that the receptionist hadn't given them already.

"Salieri and Aloysia are the company darlings," he had told them and must've not heard Constanze's quiet  _'figures'_ . "Salieri has been training under Rosenberg since he was a child, but Aloysia joined as an overcompensated apprentice later. Sometime last year, Salieri suddenly disappeared without a word or any explanations from the powers-that-be, so we thought he might've been fired, or much likely quit. Seeing him back so suddenly is surprising to be honest."  
Wolfgang had soaked everything up like a sponge. 

"Why do you call him by his surname?" He had asked curiously.

"He does the same for all of us. Why should we be personal and civil with him if he isn't with us?"

No matter how much Wolfgang had wanted to keep talking about him, the conversation strayed from Salieri afterwards, and not long after that they had parted ways from the group.

And although he hadn't gotten all the info he wanted, he was still satisfied with having made their first friends here in Vienna. This day had been a good one.

He wondered if Salieri was thinking about him, about _them_ , too. They were nothing special, yet it had been their first day in the company. So there was a chance.

By this time, his mug was taken out of his hands and replaced with a different one that smelled much more divine.

"Gosh, you're a godsent," he groaned and inhaled about half of the milk in one go.

"I hope we don't have to wait long for the role assignments," his sister mentioned as she sat down in front of him again, with her own new mug balanced expertly in one hand. "Now that we're guaranteed to dance lead roles, which ones would you like to get?" As he looked up to her she smiled brightly.

He hummed thoughtfully and looked out to the city again.

"I always liked the Nutcracker, but that's sadly not in season. Oh! I read that the Royal Ballet has made a ballet out of Alice in Wonderland. I'd be a cool Mad Hatter. But regarding ballets that are actually being produced in this company ... Siegfried would be cool, I guess. But I'd prefer dancing him in Bourne's version."  
Nannerl snorted, "Of course."

Again, he had to pout as he took his next sip. "And what about you?"

"You know I've always loved the fairy tales; so maybe Cinderella or Sleeping Beauty?"  
"Are you sure you'd fit the latter role?" he asked her impishly. She merely answered with an unimpressed look on her face. He snorted.

Then, Nannerl got her phone out and Wolfgang took that as a lull in conversation, so he focused on devouring his drink again.

"Wolfie," Nannerl said and when he looked up he was met with a camera flash and his sister's soft smile.

"Whaaaat!" His whining was met with indifference as his sister finished her own milk and stood up, wishing him a good night and retreating into her own room.

 

 

It was the next day, their second day in the company, and Wolfgang was no less excited than on their first. This morning, though, he had woken up much earlier than his alarm and been the one to prepare breakfast for his sister. He even went to wake her up, although much less gentle than she had been to him the day before.

"Nännerle!" He threw her door open and it bounced back to lightly hit him. "Today is role-assignment day!" Then, he took a run-up and threw himself beside her rudely awakened form.

When she turned around to look at him in accusation, he had jokingly taken in a pin-up pose and grinned at her widely.

"Fucking hell ...," she whispered and turned back around. She could only rest for a second more, since Wolfgang began bouncing on the mattress then and she gave up on her sleep. Groaning, she heaved herself out of bed and looked at her phone clock.

"Wolfgang! My alarm wouldn't have rang for another half an hour!"

"That's not my fault, you lazy bum," he grinned. "Today is role assignment day! I want to get there as soon as possible."  
"As if they'll hang it out this early already." Despite her protests, she stood up and threw him out to get ready.

This day's breakfast was a shorter affair than the day before, Nannerl too grumpy for being the one who had been dragged out of bed for once and Wolfgang being too lost in thoughts about what the day might hold. Still, he took the time to properly do up his sister's hair; today, he put it into a Dutch braid before pinning it up into a tight bun that would definitely hold out a day of practice.

They even coordinated their sports bags so that their training gear for that day would be matching.

By the end, they still ended up being early by over an hour, being the first ones to see the assignments.

"I can't believe this," Nannerl muttered, "Do these people not sleep? How are these up already?"

Still, she didn't complain as the both of them looked for their respective timetables.

"Found them!" Mozart shouted and pointed towards two neighbouring papers that read 'Mozart, Wolfgang Amadeus' and 'Wolfgang, Maria-Anna'. Compared to some of the others sheets, theirs looked quite empty.

"What." He said in a deadpan voice. "Why are we only assigned to one ballet-" And then he heard Nannerl gasp.  
"Wolfie!" she said in excitement. "Siegfried and Odette! We're dancing the main roles for Swan Lake!"

Up until then, he hadn't even looked at the roles themselves, only at the little amount of practice they had. It took a while until it sank in, but when it did he himself had to gasp aloud.

"Holy shit," he shouted and repeatedly hit his sister's arm until she stepped away from him.

Their first practice would even be on that day, nearly directly after class. Holy shit.

By then, soft clacking reached their ears, and when they looked to their left they could see both Constanze _and_ Aloysia walking towards them. Their eyes wide in wonder about why those two were suddenly civil enough with each other to arrive together, they watched them approach.

"Nannerl, Wolfgang; good morning! What are you looking at?" Constanze greeted them brightly, and Aloysia added a timid nod and a tight smile.

"The role assignments!" Nannerl answered while Wolfgang had already begun looking for the two girls' sheets. Since they were siblings, theirs must have been hanging underneath each other too.

He found them before Constanze and Aloysia could begin looking for them and shouted out in joy. He hadn't seen that Nannerl had _only_ been assigned the role of Odette before.

"Constanze! You're dancing the Swan Lake lead roles with us, you're Odile!"  
She obviously wanted to answer excitedly, but her sister's indignant squawking overhauled her.

"What?! But those are my roles. Let me see." Then, she shouldered her way through them and looked at the board. She obviously was displeased at having lost the lead role of one of the biggest ballets, but she still had a few other lead roles listed. Wolfgang could also spy that her list read 'Queen Mother', so she was still dancing in Swan Lake with them. Curiously, his eyes wandered over the other people's sheets and ended up getting stuck on Salieri's; he, too, had only one role assigned. Benno. But everyone else's timetables were full, so why did the three of them only have single roles?

As he pondered, he began following the girls who had already begun walking towards the changing rooms. He nearly walked into the girls' room with them, totally lost in thought, but his sister softly pushed him back with a snort and pointed him into the direction of the men's room.

It wasn't a surprise to him that he was the first one in there, so he changed in solitude and then sat down, dawdling on his phone while waiting for the others to arrive.

When they did, most of them arrived arrived in a group.

"Oh, Wolfgang!" Hannes greeted him and made him look up from his phone where he had just seen that Nannerl had posted a picture of him, from the evening before, where he sported a huge milk moustache and a surprised expression.

"The man of the hour! We just looked at the role board together and saw that you got Siegfried! Shame that you only got one role, though. I wonder why they did that," he continued and then proceeded in shamelessly stripping before him so that he could change into his dance belt and practice clothing, all the while still talking.

"I've already known my roles for Swan Lake since yesterday evening. Rosenberg called me after I had gotten back from the pub and asked wether I'd lake to dance the jester too, beside my main role of Rothbart." As he finished, he simultaneously drew the waistband-strings of his dance belt back and let them snap back towards his body lewdly. Wolfgang could feel his cheeks heat up in a slight flush.

"And? What did you say?" he asked in hopes of distractions.

"I accepted, of course! I loved dancing the jester in past renditions, but Rothbart is new and exciting. I remember that Salieri has danced him a few times and after him one of the older dancers, who sadly left recently, though."

At that, Stephanie, who had been getting dressed beside them (as did some of the other dancers, simply to listen in a bit), butted in.   
"I saw that he only got one role too, the poor sod. I wonder what he did to piss Rosenberg off like that." His voice was almost matter-of-fact, but then he turned around to Wolfgang with slightly widened eyes. "Not that you and Maria did anything to piss him off! You probably only got single roles because of ... maybe they didn't want to overexert you already?" Yet, he still sounded unsure himself. Hannes was frowning.

The busy chatting from the other danseurs in the room drowned out the sudden tense silence around them, and Wolfgang had sprung up energetically to push the conversation back into more pleasant waters and to reassure them, but just a second later, the door to the changing room opened and revealed Salieri, looking impeccable in everything but the dark rings under his eyes and the pondering expression he wore on his face. He looked a little sad, truly.

Wolfgang hadn't even noticed that he stopped in his animated talking, as had most of the other chatting amongst the other dancers, until Salieri himself looked up at the sudden silence in surprise.

He seemed to not care about them, as he immediately walked towards one of the lockers to let his bag fall down in front of it and to then disappear into one of the toilet stalls with some of his practice clothing bundled up in one hand.

Then he came out again, wearing tight leggings and walking back to his locker, and Wolfgang was vaguely aware of the others talking again but then Salieri took his shirt off and -

Oh, okay.

He had functioning eyes and everyone in the class was very attractive, but he might have to admit that he had the hots for Salieri.

 

 

Class went by without a hitch and very quickly. While Wolfgang had made it his goal to finally talk to Salieri – not even having heard his voice yet – this day didn't seem to be the time for it.

Salieri was going through class with a kind of exhausted hyperfixation, not even acknowledging Aloysia, who seemed to be his friend, even once. Even his dancing seemed lacklustre, and compared with his overall drained appearance, Wolfgang was hit with the worry he had felt in class the day before again. He wanted to make him feel better, to cheer the other man up, but something told him that it wouldn't be well-received. So instead, he tried to focus on the lesson itself, and after that on his practice session. His very first practice session in the company. He was dying to finally have it. At least he was until he was met with Rosenberg's blank face as he stepped into the room whose number had stood on his schedule, at which point he was wishing to be dead just so he wouldn't have to look at the geezer anymore. Really, he should've expected this. The ballet master put on a displeased sneer and instinctually, Wolfgang let his smile drop to mirror it.

The furrow between Rosenberg's eyes became even deeper.

"Mozart," he greeted him. "Glad you're not late. I hope you're warmed up?"

The man's voice was near monotonous, and Wolfgang couldn't help but wish to change instructors with his sister, who was having her practice with Cavalieri at the same time as he did his with Rosenberg. He let none of that show on his face, and instead put on a smile. "Yes."

"Very well. Have you danced Siegfried before?"   
Wolfgang shook his head no. Rosenberg sighed.

"We'll progress chronically, so we'll begin with the prologue and there will be extra sessions with your sister once the both of you learned the choreography for the first pas de deux ..."  
From there on, Wolfgang spent two hours with the man, perfecting the choreography he had been given so far. The man nitpicked way too much and his teaching style was far from what Wolfgang preferred in past teachers, but he had to admit that he was very skilled in helping him with learning quickly and nipping any mistakes in the bud.

Nevertheless, by the end of the session he was ready to die.

" _Ugh_." His groaning rang through the nearly empty hallway and was followed by the thud that resulted from him hitting his head against the wall that he was sitting against. Nannerl, who stood beside him, looked down. "Don't be so dramatic. It can't have been that bad."

"I don't think I've felt this strung out since father started supervising our training outside of school."

A small humming could be heard from her direction. "Point taken. Cavalieri is very strict, but at the same time very pleasant. Does that make sense? I've learned quite a lot, and we'll probably be able to dance our first pas de deux by the end of the week if this holds up."

"Thank fuck. Having the practices together might make it less awful."

 

 

The days of the first week flew by and the day came on which Wolfgang and Nannerl would dance their first pas de deux together for the first time. They were currently waiting for Rosenberg and Cavalieri, who were in the process of supervising the pas de trois training of Salieri, who danced Benno, and two female soloists. Normally, Wolfgang's and Nannerl's training was scheduled earlier than Salieri's, but had been postponed for this occasion since the soloists were needed for other productions in Salieri's usual time slot. Now, Wolfgang wasn't complaining.

He usually only got to watch Salieri in the morning class, but was able to do so now too because of the practice room having windows that faced the hallway. They weren't even the only ones watching – quite a few corps de ballet and even two or three soloists and principals were also crowding the hallway to watch them. And for good reason; Salieri was magnificent.

Wolfgang sighed.

"What?" His sister side eyed him; she stood straight with her arms crossed while he was leaning forwards on the windowsill, one hand holding his head up.

"I wish that was me," he murmured.

"Who, Benno?"  
"No, one of the ballerinas." Salieri's strong hands were currently steadying one of them as she did a dainty pirouette. Nannerl shot him an accusing gaze.

"I knew it!" she shouted and attracted the attention of the other onlookers, which made Wolfgang blush furiously. He shushed her and made a point of concentrating more on the practice.

They had just gotten to the solos of the three, first the two ballerinas and then Salieri. The grand climax of the pas de trois.

Loud, lively music reached his ears even through the thick walls and Salieri's dancing matched it perfectly. Sure, Wolfgang had seen dancers perform Benno before, but it never ceased to impress him. Jump after jump, one impressive display of strength after another. Salieri's legs flexed under the strain, and Wolfgang had never been quite as happy with the tight shirts that Salieri preferred to wear as he was in that moment, when Salieri took the time to languidly stretch his arms out while he was striking poses. The music came to an end, and so did the black-haired man, breathing heavily, before it shifted into the next movement and the ballerinas took over the centre of the room again, each dancing another little solo before they were joined by Salieri again and ended in a graceful pose together.

A sudden commotion broke Wolfgang out of his reverie – thunderous clapping from the dancers beside him, cheering for the danseur and the two soloists. It seemed to be loud enough to reach inside the practice room, as Salieri suddenly looked towards the windows in surprise, quickly letting the ballerina he was holding onto go and composing himself when he saw all of them standing there.

His gaze landed on Wolfgang and Nannerl, staying on them for a bit longer than on everybody else, before he diverted his attention to the two instructors in the room with them. Rosenberg seemed to be giving him criticism, while Cavalieri stood with the soloists and said a few soft words for them. That seemed to be the end of their practice session, as Salieri bowed to the instructors before storming out of the room, shouldering past the dancers who were standing in front of it and briskly escaping down the corridor. The soloists followed much slower, and then it was Wolfgang's and Nannerl's turn to step into the lions' den.

"Thank you for waiting for us," Cavalieri greeted them while Rosenberg was kneeling in front of the CD-player they would be using for this practice, trying to find the song for their pas de deux.

"We'll go through the pas de deux today, and Mister Krüger will join us next time so that you can practice with him dancing Rothbart in the background, just to experience it once as it should be."

Then, the first soft tunes of _No 10 – Scène (Moderato)_ rang out through the room and Wolfgang readied himself to dance. His part was easy, really. Most of it was walking around and acting, which he had memorised through watching a few videos that had been provided to him. He would be bored, if it weren't for him being able to watch his sister's graceful dancing. She played the biggest part of their first pas de deux, while he just danced around her, occasionally holding her and admiring in general. At least he didn't have to act that part.

Their practice was over way faster than Salieri's had been, and Rosenberg and Cavalieri didn't even have anything to criticise.

"We'll split up from here and continue your individual training in the following choreographies," Rosenberg informed them. "Would you like to stay here Madame? Mozart and I can go somewhere else." Cavalieri nodded, so Wolfgang turned around to walk out. As he did that, he noticed that some of the crowd from before was still there, but now, Aloysia and Constanze had joined too.

Constanze was smiling, her phone pointed at the window, while her sister had a dangerously blank face, her arms crossed in front of her.   
Wolfgang smiled uneasily and walked out of the room, eager for this week to be done.

 


	5. Ballon

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Finally back after my short hiatus~ I'm upping my upload rate to once every two weeks; chapter 6 is already finished so that'll definitely be up in two week's time and we'll see after that. 
> 
> **Terms for this chapter:**  
>  sissonnee – jump done from two feet to one foot  
> entrechat – the dancer jumps into the air and rapidly crosses the legs before and behind  
> tour en lair – turn in the air  
> grand jeté - describes a big jump where the dancer throws one leg into the air, pushes off the floor with the other, jumping into the air and landing again on the first leg  
> pirouette – a non-traveling turn on one leg  
> ballon - showing lightness of movement in leaps and jumps  
> turnout - rotation of the legs at the hips, resulting in knees and feet facing away from each other  
> plié – the dancer bends the knee(s), keeping the heel(s) on the ground
> 
> Enjoy!

It was the middle of the next week and Wolfgang wanted to _scream._

Firstly, the initial excitement of their new situation had begun waning and as a result he had begun to feel like shit. Not even a good long, satisfying shit. No, a diarrheous shitstain on the side of a greasy pavement.

Secondly, class and practice of that day had left him drained and unsatisfied; Rosenberg had been more than displeased with his performance (they were currently practising Act 3) and normally, Wolfgang would just let the instructor's ire bounce off his good mood, but today he was afraid to say that he  _agreed_ with that old geezer. He had been no good that day and that just didn't sit right with him.  
_Lastly_ he had dressed extra fucking adorable today and wanted to post a cute selfie on his Instagram, just to cheer himself up, but he just couldn't get the  _fuckin angle right and-_

"ARGH," he shouted after his n-th failed attempt and nearly threw his phone to the ground, before he restrained himself since that thing had been expensive and their newfound independence meant that he couldn't just leech a new one off his parents.  
Godfuckingdamnit.

"What's got your panties in a twist?" his sister came in and asked as she looked down to him, where he sat in front of the sofa in their living room. She then let herself drop down beside him, reaching for the remote to turn the TV on, looking for a program she could watch while snacking on the small bag of crisps she had in her lap. Wolfgang made grabby hands. Nannerl put them out of his reach.

"Get your own," she told him, her eyes still glued to the screen while she channel-surfed for something non-trashy.

"Why do we even pay for this," she murmured, "Let's check Netflix instead, maybe I can watch a few episodes of something before I have to get ready."

"Are you sure I can't come too?" Nannerl and Constanze had arranged a meeting to … Wolfgang didn't even know what they'd do. He only knew that he was barred from it and that he strongly disliked it.

"Nope," she let the 'p' plop. "But you can join in on our first girl's night!"

He answered with a sarcastic 'thanks' before he looked down at Instagram again, this time at the stories of the people he was following. The first one that popped up was from Hannes, who was chugging a whole line of shots in his dad's pub. In broad daylight. On a wednesday.

He sent him a eye-rolling smiley as a reaction and jumped to the next story, not expecting an answer from the man just yet. A few stories from friends back home in Salzburg turned up, and Wolfgang eyed them curiously, trying to puzzle together what he was missing out on. He hadn't even called any of them yet and he had to admit that he wasn't really feeling up to it, either. Maybe some other time.

Next came Constanze's most recent stories; first, a picture of baby-blue pointe shoes that had been prettily decorated with white lace and paint, and some tiny fake-jewels. He pressed his thumb down to stop the timer of the story and turned the screen towards his sister, so that she could look at it too.

"I know!" she smiled. "I already saw this one, she is really skilled. Did you know that her mother is the head of the shoe-making department in our company? She must've learned it from her." She hummed. "Maybe she'll do some for me too, sometimes ..."

Somehow, her answer made him feel a bit empty without him even understanding why, so he just didn't answer and took his thumb from the picture so it could jump to the next one. This one showed new, still white, pointe shoes, with some more pink painting utensils, lace, and ribbons lying beside them, taken an hour after the first one. Wolfgang skipped it after a second of looking at it.

The last unseen story belonged to Lorenzo, who had posted a cropped picture of one of the practice room pianos, sheet music on the music stand and a blurry Stephanie in the background, doing barre-work.

Wolfgang skipped that one too, locked his phone and then put it on the ground, screen-down, with a tiny thud.

"God, Wolfie, you really are in a bad mood. Is it still from practice today?" Nannerl asked and put an arm around him, now holding the bag of crisps out to him.

Wolfgang took a handful and stuffed his face, nodding and leaning into his sister's embrace.

"Why don't you go train a little bit more, then? To either try to improve or to let some steam off? They didn't give us keys for nothing, after all, and I'm sure you'll be able to find an empty practice room."

Wolfgang didn't give her an answer, half of the reason being that he was thinking it over, the other that his mouth was literally stuffed to the brim. Even after he had swallowed everything did he only sit there, considering her suggestion. He had never before practiced alone for more than a few minutes; in the past, he usually always had his sister with him, or another friend, or in the worst of cases his father. It would feel weird being all alone in such a big building, dancing for no one but himself. But Wolfgang was restless, and he would be alone soon anyway with his sister going out, so he might as well do some work. He nodded.

"Okay," he finally told her. "Do you mind if I borrow your speaker?"  
"Not at all; it's on my desk. Let's give each other status updates during the night?"

"Of course. Greet Constanze for me?" His sister nodded and he got up to walk into his room to change, but not without making a quick detour to Nannerl's room to fetch her speaker.

He put on his practice clothing – just some leggings and leg warmers, a simple tanktop and an oversized semitransparent sweater on top so that he could still see his form – and put his canvas ballet shoes, speaker, phone and keys into a knapsack before he walked out of his room to give his sister a goodbye hug and left the flat.

 

 

Walking through the company building this late was really creepy. Sure, all the lights were still on and he encountered a janitor on the way to the practice room he had in mind, but to find the hallways being so silent … he was used to hearing the shuffling around of dancers walking to and fro, the sweet tunes of classical music or the soft thumps of feet hitting the ground after jumping drifting out of the practice rooms he walked by, the annoying creaking of Rosenberg's instructions from ten rooms away. The more it surprised him to hear music from one of the rooms he walked by on the way to the room he intended to use, and curiously he stood in front of the door to listen, since this one had no windows towards the hallway. The song was very familiar.

Without allowing himself to think on it, Wolfgang opened the door as silently as he could and stepped in.

Who he encountered inside didn't surprise him. After all, he had recognized the music.

But seeing the man actually dance still took his breath away. Salieri was in the process of doing the _sissonnee_ jumps followed by two _entrechats_ and the _tour en lair_ , his eyes focused on his own form in the mirror so he didn't see Wolfgang just yet. Wolfgang didn't exactly mind, as it gave him the chance to watch him perform. The jumps turned into languid poses, before Salieri prepared himself for the finale of his solo – the _grand jetés_. Before he could launch into the first one, though, his eyes fell on Wolfgang and he suddenly held still, awkwardly standing in the room, the boasting music replacing the silence that would've otherwise stood between them. The _Moderato_ came to an end and shifted into the airy tunes of _Allegro_ , making the situation even more comical in Wolfgang's eyes.  
Salieri scrambled to turn it off. Only then did Wolfgang allow the smile that had been tugging on his lips to fully form.  
"Hello there," he greeted the dark-haired man in his usual chipper manner. "I don't think we've properly introduced ourselves to each other yet. I'm Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart."  
"I know that," Salieri answered and then hurriedly added onto it, "And I'm Antonio Salieri. Pleasure to meet you, Mozart."  
And, good god. Wolfgang hadn't even realized that he hasn't heard the man talk before. Hearing his name drip off the man's lips so peculiarly – not sharp, like he was used to, but with a soft tilt, originating from an accent – made him blush involuntarily. He wanted more.  
"The pleasure is all mine, and call me Wolfgang."

Silence. Again, awkward.

"Do you mind if I practice in here too?" He finally asked after having given up on waiting for Salieri, who seemed content with just staring at Wolfgang and … not making a sound. Was he even breathing?

It took a moment for the black-haired man to nod, the few strands that had fallen out of his ponytail bobbing with the movement.

"Thank you. I've only seen you dance this part so far, why don't you practice your other ones? Surely Rosenberg has taught you more than that?" Wolfgang enquired with a smile, eager to hear the man's voice again. At first he only nodded again, and Wolfgang already felt disappointment, but some angel must've been looking over him and forced the words out of the other danseur.

"I've already been shown all my parts, but I prefer perfecting one after another and feel like this is the one I've got the most trouble with. So I'm. Only practising this right now." He blinked at Wolfgang a few times. "What about you?" Where his voice had been pretty monotonous so far, Wolfgang felt like it held some curiosity now.

"I haven't been taught all of it yet, but most of it. I came here tonight because I'm not happy with how today's practice with Rosenberg went."

Again, Salieri nodded, but didn't say anything else as he turned back around to his speakers and turned the music on again, dead-set on keeping on practising.

A bit frustrated, Wolfgang harrumphed and walked to the other side of the room, taking out his headphones instead of the speaker as he had intended - after all, having both their music overlap would do neither of them good. And if Salieri didn't want to talk anyway, even though they had just finally gotten around to it … then that's just that.

So he listened to his playlist while warming up before he finally put on the music to his solo.

Overjoyed tunes crept into his brain, and Wolfgang immediately became immersed in his role; the solo took place just after prince Siegfried met and danced with Odile for the first time, struck by her beauty and wanting to take her for wife.  
Some slow arm movements preluded the sequence, which started out with a jump from the left leg, an _entrechat_ in the air, and a landing on the right leg, before he did a _tour en l'air_ and another jump which consisted of him throwing his legs up sideways and letting them bat against each other. A bit of running around, two more jumps without any _entrechats_ , and a _pirouette_ that ended in a gracefully reaching pose. All done in _ballon_ , of course, to properly display Siegfried's happiness.

Then came the part he just couldn't be satisfied with – he had to make two more plain jumps, which he was fine with, before he had to seque into another. This one required him to launch off one leg on the spot (and stationary jumps were always the worst to him, especially when he couldn't use both legs to set off) and to throw the other leg up as high and straight as he could, before landing again and doing a few turns, after which he had to repeat this jump from hell. He hadn't gotten it right even once that day, and that didn't suddenly change with this evening's practice, his left leg either not reaching as high as he wanted it to or it being sloppy whenever he reached a decent height. So everytime he made this mistake, he broke the music off and started anew. He didn't know for how long he danced on, dozens of times, until sweat broke from his skin and made his hair and clothing stick to his body. His concentration didn't waver even once, his eyes glued to his own form in the mirror and his head filled with the uplifting melodies of the music. So it came as a total surprise to him that when he closed his eyes and stemmed his hands against his hips, Salieri suddenly stood beside him when he looked up again.

Startled, he winced and accidentally elbowed Salieri's gut – and why was he even standing so close? - but the man didn't seem to mind as he made a hand gesture next to his ears and moved his lips around words. Only then did Wolfgang notice that music was still blasting from his headphones so he scrambled to take them off.

"-ke them out. Thank you," he caught the tailend of what the dark-haired danseur was saying. "I watched you. I mean – I caught a bit of it in the mirror. And, well .. I couldn't help but notice you've got some trouble with part of your solo?"

Stumped, Wolfgang simply nodded.

"You've never danced Siegfried before?" Another nod. "Would you like some help?"

Well, this day had just gone from miserable to fucking elating in the course of thirty seconds.

Wolfgang's treacherous mind was already in the gutter, imagining how a private lesson with maestro Salieri would look like, would  _feel_ like. Would he correct Wolfgang's form physically, put his hands on his waist to steady him like the did with that ballerina on the day Wolfgang and Nannerl watched him practise the pas de trois, or would he just intently watch and verbally correct him?

He'd actually melt with Salieri concentrating so strongly on him.

Eager for his death, he nodded.

"Yea, sure. Thank you!" A smile, hopefully more gracious than nervous, appeared on his lips, and expectantly he looked at the other danseur and waited.

"Could you dance up to the part you've got trouble with for me?" Salieri then asked him and Wolfgang did so, this time facing the other man instead of the mirror and with the music blaring from his speakers instead of his headphones. Again, he could feel that his leg didn't even reach as high as it was supposed to _and_ that his body tension was less than desirable on top of that.

Salieri paused the music and obviously thought about what he had seen.

"Turn around to the barre," he said and Wolfgang immediately did as he was told. "Now can you please place your left leg on the barre and stretch until it's at about the angle it's supposed to be at for the jump."

He had to move his other foot further away from the barre for that, and lean forward quite a lot, but it was nothing too difficult. Salieri stepped closer to him and let his hand hover above his stretched leg.

"May I?" he asked, and Wolfgang nodded. Just a second later, he could feel Salieri's fingers prodding at the muscles above his leg's joint, between his hip and quadriceps. Wolfgang was proud of himself for only flinching a little and listened for anything dark, tall and handsome could have to say. At first, he only hummed again, but then he spoke up.

"You seem a little tense here – more than should be from the stretch. When I was dancing the role, I found that this jump improved by me being more relaxed, and this muscle used to be quite stressed for me back then. So I'd recommend either visiting the company's physiotherapist or looking up a good massager. Also, your turnout and plié for going into this jump are quite sloppy, you're concentrating too much on the jump and not enough on how it's initiated. Try again and take more care of the launching; the better your height, the more time you have to get your leg in position."  
Then, he stepped back again and waited for Wolfgang to dance the sequence anew.  
Wolfgang paid special care to the other danseur's advice and made sure to properly execute his turnout and go into a bit deeper plié this time – and, true to Salieri's advice, the jump was much easier to execute this time around. It wasn't perfect yet, but it was much better than before.  
Overjoyed, he stopped dancing and beamed at the other man.

"This was so much better, thank you so much!"

Salieri's nodding was accompanied by a small, satisfied smile this time, and he was about to turn around and go back to his own training, so Wolfgang wrecked his brain for something to say that would make him stay.

"Antonio-," he started, but immediately caught his misstep. "Is it okay if I call you that?"

The other man was staring at him with eyes widened in surprise, but at least he wasn't shouting at him so he couldn't be too angry.

"No. You can call me that, if you want to."

"Okay, thank you!" Wolfgang grinned at him. "You know, we haven't talked before today. Would you like to chat a bit? It's already quite late and I'm feeling a bit tired – and you've been at it for longer than me, so it's probably the same for you? - but I don't want to go home just yet."

Antonio appeared to be thinking it over for a few seconds, but it didn't take him long to nod in affirmation.

"Great! Would you like to go out for some late dinner? Or we could also stay here if you don't want to do that! And if you're not tired yet then that's fine, we can chat a bit while you train!"

"It's fine, I'm … I would like to grab some dinner with you." Antonio didn't look too sure of that, but nevertheless he began packing up his things so Wolfgang took that as his clue to do the same.

The sky had already been turning to night by the time he had entered the company building, but now it was as dark as ink, with barely a star in sight and the moon showing just the slightest crescent. Being short-sighted as always, Wolfgang hadn't remembered to bring a jacket since it had been pretty warm when he went out; it thankfully wasn't too cold now, but he could still feel shivers run up and down his spine, what with his body still being heated up from the practice.

"Here, take this," Antonio suddenly spoke up from beside him and pressed a ridiculously large scarf into Mozart's hands. When he looked at him in disbelief, he just shrugged.

"I've got poor blood circulation. I'm alright while I'm training, but outside of that …," was his only explanation as he buttoned up his light coat and turned right, Wolfgang stumbling after him while he wound the thick scarf around his neck and shoulders, immediately feeling much warmer.

Antonio seemed to know where he was going, so Wolfgang simply followed him in silence. They stopped at a small shop on the way and bought something to-go instead of, like he had expected, sitting down in the establishment. They kept walking for a while, the quiet steadily becoming more unbearable for Wolfgang, until they reached the Danube and began crossing it on one of its many pedestrian bridges; but instead of fully crossing it, Antonio stopped right in the middle and turned a bit so that he could lean against the railing and look out over the river and the city. Wolfgang joined him and finally took in the view too – before that, he had been way too occupied with staring down at the floor in thought. The constellations still hadn't come out in the firmament, but the colourful lights of the city were mirrored mesmerisingly in the rippling waters underneath.

It was beautiful.

He had half a mind to get out his phone and take a picture to post on Instagram, but no. He wanted to enjoy this, and maybe, but just maybe, he simply wanted to keep it to himself. To themselves.

"This is so beautiful, Antonio," he breathed. "I've never been here at night. Thank you for taking me."

"You're welcome," Antonio answered and took the first bite of his lunch.

Wolfgang emulated him and initiated a proper conversation. He had had enough time to think of things to ask on their way to the bridge. "So, tell me the story about how you became Rosenberg's favourite slave."

"He's not that bad," Antonio immediately said, but not with passion behind his words. "I was a talented young dancer, even training under the La Scala Theatre Ballet School, but both my parents died when I was still quite young so I could not stay there anymore." His voice didn't waver from its indifference as he said this. "A family friend from here took me in and enabled me to continue my training in the academy, with Rosenberg as my advisor. Back then, he wasn't ballet master yet, so he still had time to teach students. He got promoted shortly before my graduation, and ensured I was given a permanent position here. And what about you? How did you end up in this glorious metropolis of Vienna?"

Wolfgang soaked everything he said up like a sponge and tried to commit everything to memory, lest he forget it.

"I'm sorry you lost your parents and your shot at La Scala," he mumbled. "My sister and I grew up in Salzburg and went to academy there, too. Our mother was a prima ballerina who toured the world, but her homestead was Salzburg, where she also met our father. From what I know, he used to dance too but injured himself gravely before his career could take off, so instead he began playing the piano accompaniment to the ballet classes and practices. Anyway – we trained there and got accepted in the company right after graduating its academy. Then, a few weeks ago, the head of the Vienna State Ballet discovered us on Youtube, or Instagram, I don't even know, and invited us to his company. We're quite popular on social media, but not as well known in the world of ballet."

Salieri scowled as he finished off the last bit of his food.

"What's your mother's name?"

"Anna Maria Pertl. She kept dancing under her maiden name until she retired, and after that she took on my father's name."  
The other danseur looked at him in surprise.  
"I know her! Her performance of Kitri in Don Quixote was legendary. I admittedly haven't seen much of her, but I loved the recording I saw of that."

"I know, right? My dad's got whole boxes of recordings of her performances at home, Nannerl and I used to watch them a lot in our free time." Having finished his own food and slowly becoming tired of just standing around, Wolfgang let himself fall to the floor and stuck his legs through the gaps of the bridge's railing. After a moment or two, Antonio hesitantly joined him.

"If your mother is so famous, why aren't you and your sister more well-known?" Antonio looked at him curiously. "If you don't mind me asking."  
"Like I said, she danced under her maiden name and not many people know what name she goes by now. And the contract we signed when entering the academy and later the Salzburg company dictated that the company's head, Colloredo, had to approve before anyone could join international competitions. So Nannerl and I never got permission to compete in the Prix de Lausanne, the USAIBC or anything like that. Have you?"  
Antonio's lovely features were marred by a frown. "Why would he not let you compete? I got encouraged to compete, but I only danced in the Lausanne twice and did a few small ones in Russia and the USA."  
" _Only_. And Colloredo's an asshole, that's why. I'm glad we've left now." He let his legs dangle back and forth in indignation.

"Couldn't you have left sooner?"  
"We were contractually obligated to work in the company for two years after graduation, and after that we just stayed out of habit. But it's good that we got away, I don't know if we would've went against our parents' wishes without a catalyst. What about you? Why is primo ballerino Antonio Salieri still dancing in this sleepy state of Austria?"

"Don't call me that," Antonio complained and scowled when Wolfgang only chuckled in response. "And I guess out of the same reasons as you. This has been my home for the last decade or so, I make a good living, have build up a reputation and am respected. An international reputation would be nice I think, but I guess it's too late for me now that I … nevermind." He had begun mirroring the swaying of Wolfgang's legs and didn't even seem to notice. "You know that you can still do international competitions, reach for farther stars? This company is generally very encouraging about that kind of thing. You've got the talent to succeed."  
"Aww Antonio, I'm blushing!"  
"Shut up."

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Heh.
> 
> **Reference/Inspiration I used for this:**  
>  I used this as a reference to describe Mozart dancing Siegfried's solo after meeting Odile.
> 
> Come chat with me on Tumblr or Twitter! (Hakuryen on both)


	6. Épaulé

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Important Author's Notes at the end.
> 
> But for now, enjoy!

They had kept talking for another hour or so, and when the cold had finally gotten too poignant for either of them to ignore they had parted ways on that bridge, Wolfgang to go back where they came from and Antonio to walk into the opposite direction. And if Wolfgang turned around twice to look after the other danseur, no one else but him and the dozens of other passerbys would know about that.

He had walked home with a spring in his step – although he was decidedly _not_ skipping – and thrown the door open in preparation of boasting about what had happened this evening, but his sister wasn't even home yet. Neither did she step over the threshold in the next hour, and Wolfgang's good mood had begun to deflate and made way for worry. 

_Are you okay?_ , he sent her. Two agonisingly slow minutes later, he got a reply. 

_Yes, everything's alright! Hope you had a good evening, don't wait up for me. XX_

He sent back a barrage of smileys and his own Xs and Os before he trodded off to his room to change and to hit the feathers. Only then did Wolfgang notice that he had never given Antonio his scarf back, and it took all his willpower to not abuse it as a sort of stuffed animal for the night. With his resolve all spent, he couldn't keep his mind from wandering back to this evening's friendly outlet (it definitely was  _not_ a date) and to everything he had learned about tall, dark and handsome. With a smile on his face, he fell asleep. He couldn't wait for the next day.

 

 

Again, Wolfgang woke up before his alarm could force him to and quietly padded towards the kitchen. On the way, he stuck his head in Nannerl's room to see if she had come home safe, and after he had gotten the reassurance that that was indeed the case, he resumed his prior path towards the fridge. Nannerl seemed to have brought leftover pizza home, so he settled for that as his breakfast and, after a second thought, added a banana to his meal because his sister would actually behead him for starting off his day this unhealthily. A chair was forgone, as was a plate, as he sat on the counter instead and tried not to let any toppings fall on his pyjamas; his legs were swinging around just like they did the evening before and Wolfgang was absentmindedly humming the melody for his solo.

The door to Nannerl's room creaked open, and she mirrored its tone. "Morning. How long have you been up for?" She shuffled over to the kitchen, rubbing her eyes, and put the kettle on on her way to the fridge.

"Morning. Not for long," Wolfgang greeted her softly and let his clean hand pet through her hair as she walked by. "How was your evening with Constanze?"

She poured herself a bowl of cereal and then a coffee while Wolfgang munched on the rest of his own breakfast, and only when she had taken her first sip of black goo (no, he most definitely wasn't making a face at her devil's tar anymore) did she answer.

"It was lots of fun. How about your evening, how was practice?"  
"What did you do?"  
"Not telling. Now answer, did your practice go well?" With every sip she took, she looked more human.

Wolfgang hummed. "I met Antonio. Salieri," he added when Nannerl looked at him with a confused expression. "He was also practising and I joined him."  
Her features immediately brightened up, the last remnants of tiredness washed away by her curiosity. She didn't even have to tell him to go on before he began gushing.

"He's such a good dancer, and his voice is so nice. He was also really kind – even though he was kinda awkward about it – since he helped me with what I was having trouble with. We went out to have dinner after and talked a lot. Did you know he went to the La Scala before coming to Vienna?"  
She shook her head, her lips curled into a smile and her head propped on the hand that wasn't clutching onto the coffee mug. "Yes, he did! After that, he came here and studied under Rosenberg. He said Rosenberg hasn't always been this annoying; can you believe that?"

Now that his hands were free, he was gesticulating widely, and gushed on a bit longer about what he had learned of the other danseur. Only after a little while did he notice Nannerl's mischievous smile.

"What?"

"You're so smitten." She sounded happy about it, maybe even a little proud, and Wolfgang blushed.

"Also, we should really get ready or you'll be late to seeing your prince charming."

He didn't bother with answering; he simply playfully glared at her and jumped off the counter to run to his room and try to make today's outfit even cuter than yesterday's. When he couldn't come up with anything, he decided to just do a u-turn and put on some cool leggings and a tank top with especially deep cuts under the arms. If Antonio could show off his body, so could he.

He helped Nannerl do her long, thick hair up again ("You're a godsent, Wolfi, if I had to do that myself my arms would fall off") and together, they walked to the company.

The receptionist called out a greeting to them as always and they waved back before they went to the changing rooms, stopping just briefly at the notice-board where a few new papers had been hung out.

The men's changing room was already filled with busy chatter and Wolfgang had to bump a few shoulders to get to his usual locker between Hannes and Stephanie. The former was thankfully not standing around buck-naked and the latter was busy tapping away on his phone.

"Hey," he greeted them and didn't complain about how much Hannes' friendly punch to his shoulder hurt. Stephanie only answered with a hum and kept his fingers speeding over the keyboard.

He had half a mind to turn around and look for Antonio, but on the way in he could see that his usual space in front of the lockers had been deserted so he already knew he wouldn't be there. Still, he kept his ears attuned to the door in hopes of hearing it open.

But time went by and while the door _did_ open a few times, if only to let in other danseurs, Antonio didn't appear, and soon Wolfgang ran out of any reasons to stay in the locker room.

"You coming?" Hannes asked him and then shot a look towards Stephanie beside him. "And what's up with you? You've had your eyes glued to the screen since coming in."

"I've come out," Stephanie replied, not looking up.  
"What?"

"I posted a picture of me kissing Lorenzo on the cheek to my Instagram story yesterday, forgetting that a few of my family members follow me on there, and I guess word spread around and now I'm facing a shitstorm of messages."

Concerned, Wolfgang immediately put a soothing hand on his arm. "Nothing bad I hope?"  
"Mostly good stuff, yea," he murmured but still scowled down at his phone. That is, until Hannes pulled it out of his hands.  
"No use breaking your head over it now. Come on, let's go to class so that your boyfriend can cheer you up," the taller man teased and shepherded them out of the room and towards the practice room.

"He's not even my boyfriend," Stephanie retorted and surprised, both Hannes and Mozart looked at him.  
"Not?"  
"It's … complicated."  
"I'm sure it is," Hannes grinned and held the door open for them. Only a few other dancers were already in the room, and the piano in the corner was occupied by Lorenzo, who Stephanie immediately went to. Wanting to give them some privacy, even in this public space, Wolfgang looked around for either Nannerl or Constanze and when he couldn't find either of them, he let himself drop down beside Hannes and began with his warm-up. While doing so, he got out his phone with the intention to check his social media, which he hadn't done since the last afternoon.

He pulled up Instagram first, since Stephanie's story had made him curious. He impatiently skipped the first of the stories from people he followed and nearly did the same to Stephanie's story. It was only one picture; a selfie of Stephanie kissing Lorenzo's cheek, who was grinning into the camera, the Vienna Ferris Wheel in the background and everything back-lit by twilight. It looked ridiculously cute and Wolfgang couldn't keep a smile off his face. There were no other stories which he was interested in (Nannerl hadn't posted anything at all yesterday, while Hannes had added about five dozen stories to that first picture of him drinking in the bright midday sun, which he would not force himself through) so he switched to Twitter and, after that, Snapchat.

When he was halfway through checking his Snapchat feed, Nannerl and Constanze finally came and sat down to join him in stretching and chatting. He loved talking to them, but his heart wasn't in it, as he kept glancing to the clock every five seconds and steadily grew more nervous the closer the clock's fingers came toward's the time class would begin.

Three minutes to go and the door finally banged open to let Antonio in, who looked more than rushed and immediately sent an apologising gaze towards Rosenberg, who just nodded.

Wolfgang's head had whipped towards the door as soon as he heard it open this loudly, and in excitement he grinned at the black haired man and gave the floor beside him a few good, firm pats.

But Antonio didn't even look down at him as he walked by, instead choosing to sit beside Aloysia, and Wolfgang's heartstrings ripped, dropping his heart like a stone dragging him down.

He had thought they would become friends after the previous day's encounter, but … apparently not. Maybe Antonio's companionability was only a one-night thing, or, god forbid, pity. Maybe he had felt pressured by Wolfgang. Maybe, maybe, maybe.

Nevertheless, he wouldn't push his luck and cling to the black haired danseur like a friendship-sucking louse. Instead, he should focus on ballet. After all, his father had been telling him that focusing on his career was more important than wasting away time with his peers from day one.

And if he kept visiting that bridge – so what, he went for the view, and totally not because it was his one personal connection to Antonio.

 

 

Days went by and while Wolfgang was still hoping for a bit of attention from Antonio at the beginning, his hope soon began to wane before disappearing completely. And why was he even complaining? He had his wonderful sister, and Constanze who he grew closer to by the day, and he was friends with a lot of the other balletists, like Hannes and Stephanie.

Still, he couldn't help but occasionally side-eye Aloysia who seemed to be Antonio's only friend in jealousy. He didn't have anything against her personally – far from it, actually, he admired her poise and skill, and in a parallel universe he might have even fallen in love with her. In another universe in which he didn't fall in love with Antonio first and in which he didn't envy her for her closeness with him.

"You can't love him yet, you've only talked to him once," his sister interrupted his and Constanze's shared hateversation about Aloysia. They might be taking mean jabs at her in these kinds of conversations, which Nannerl usually wouldn't allow ('There's no reason to badmouth someone behind their back'), but both of their words had an underlying fondness to them. Constanze due to Aloysia being her sister, and Wolfgang due to his love for the art of ballet.

"You've never talked to coffee and yet you still declare your love for it every morning," he retaliated with his bottom lip pushed out in a pout, and Constanze hummed in agreement.

"Still, I don't think he doesn't want to have anything against you," Constanze overtoned Nannerl's exasperated sigh. "Besides, Aloysia is getting married anyway so you've got no reason to be jealous."  
"What, she is? Why didn't you tell me earlier?" Wolfgang had sat up from their little cuddle-pile on the sofa.

"I thought the big fat engagement ring on her finger was a pretty good clue. You know, for someone who notices when Salieri is wearing a different hairtie than usual or that he must've gotten new ballet shoes, you can be pretty oblivious sometimes."

"Oh shush you," he grinned, happy about this 'new' discovery. "Does your genius deduction maybe also tell you whether Antonio likes dudes?"  
Chuckling, she pushed his eye-waggling face away. "You shush! Aloysia is my sister, that's why I know – I don't have a single clue about Salieri!"

He laughed back, but grew silent after a few seconds, a sudden feeling of sadness getting the better of him. They were joking as if he had a realistic chance with Antonio, as if they were friends at least, when in reality the man had been ignoring him for days. But his sister and Constanze didn't know about that, for all they knew he and Salieri were still talking with each other, chatting and meeting up in their free time, while staying professional in the studios.

God, he wished.

 

 

Between his schedule growing busier with each new dawn and his willingness to push thoughts about the other danseur away, it came as no surprise that the possibility of meeting Antonio again when he went to the company to have another evening of unsupervised training didn't even cross his mind. Wolfgang's motives weren't the same as last time, but they came close enough – a workday spent frustrating over his performance, a tingling in his limbs that called for relief, his sister gently pushing him to take initiative on improving himself. It was much later than the last time he had gone, the sun having already left the earth to fight off darkness alone (Vienna was faring well better in that aspect than Salzburg had done, the city lights battling the stars and illuminating even the darkest of shadows) with even the caretakers of the company building missing from the empty halls.

His feet automatically carried him towards the room he had practised in with Antonio oh-so many days ago, this time vacant of any tones, but signs on its and its neighbouring doors alerted him to the fact that all the rooms in this floor of the lesser used wing of the building would be renovated and were therefore out of order. Making his way to the next floor, he could now hear music coming from it. Once he had reached the top of the staircase, he looked down the dark corridor and could see light flooding out of one of the rooms – one of those that held windows towards the hallway. Curious, he listened closer. The song was far from foreign to him, a melody he knew like the back of his hand from having watched Antonio's practices, and he felt hope ignite in him; hope to get another taste of that companionship he had felt the last time they had met like this.

Light-footed and -hearted, he made his way over to the room and looked through its windows, out of view from the dark haired danseur. The man had just begun his solo, and Wolfgang watched intently with the intention of making his presence known once Antonio was done so he wouldn't startle him. His solo had already been amazing the last time Wolfgang had seen it, but he managed to improve it even more since then – his jumps lighter yet stronger, his back a bit less stiff and more self-assured as was fitting for Benno. Wolfgang was already readying himself to knock on the window and clap, when Antonio suddenly broke off mid-jump and let himself fall to the floor, clutching and slightly hitting his knee with tears in his eyes.

Aghast, Wolfgang froze. He almost made his way inside to make sure that the other man was alright, but Antonio had already stood up again and pushed his hair back with a deep exhale, looking as if his fall just been a familiar annoyance. What if he'd react badly to Wolfgang coming in and mothering him?  
So Wolfgang left.

He left with guilt clutching his heart tight, and took the long, detoured way home, trying to clear his mind. Antonio had looked as if that hadn't been a one-time happenstance. And he had hit his knee, as if accusing it; but why? Had he been practising alone so often, had he fallen many more times than just today, was he pushing himself too far in search for perfection? Wolfgang had seen incredible dancers fall from fame before, and he didn't want the same to happen to the man he adored.

But … should he talk to him about it? They had only talked once before, so what gave him the right to suddenly play the concerned friend. God, he wasn't even a friend. And he didn't want to lose his chance at that before he even got around to trying to grasp it, just by being nosy.

He had no idea what the right thing to do was, and it killed him.

 

 

The next morning, after a very much fitful night, Wolfgang still hadn't come to a conclusion and picked at his breakfast, downtrodden.

"What's got your panties in a twist?" Nannerl asked from the opposite side of the table. "Is everything alright? You've been down and closed off since you came home yesterday night."

And like a levee breaking, everything flooded out of him. He again told her about that evening with Antonio, even though she had already heard about it the day after it happened, and then about the days after that, Antonio ignoring him, and just what he had seen the night before. By the end of his tale, he had tears in his eyes and a quiver in his voice, yet his heart felt ten times lighter. Never before had Wolfgang kept something from Nannerl, even if it was only the fact that somebody was pretending he didn't exist, for that long and he didn't even know why he did this time, probably a byproduct of his sudden feeling of independence, so telling her felt liberating.

He hadn't noticed that they had been drifting away from each other.

"Oh Wolfie," his sister murmured and walked around the table to pull him into a hug.

"Why didn't you tell me that you weren't on talking basis anymore? Please don't make yourself be sad alone; I'm your sister, I'm here for when you need me. And I'm sorry, I know I haven't been there for you lately, what with me meeting up with Constanze so often."  
A sob tore itself from him and he hugged her back, tightly.

"It's alright, I'm happy for you and didn't want to drag you down." he whispered. "But … what should I do?"

"You would never. I'd rather you talk to me if something weighs heavily on your mind." She was obviously in thought for a few moments.

"Let's say … once is a chance, twice is coincidence, but third time is a pattern. Maybe wait a few days to go there again at night and if he's there again, you can confront him. I understand you wanting him to like you, but if he really is dear to you, then his health is more important than friendship."

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hey guys, soo ... I know I said I'd try to keep this on a regular updating schedule, but right now I'm nullifying that to tell you that this story is going on a **deliberate 1-2 month hiatus.**  
>  But no worries, I'm not giving up on this story! In fact, if everything goes well, you won't have to wait long for chapters anymore after this hiatus. I'm not making wobbly promises again, though, so we'll see how it goes ~  
> And, secondly, I made a spreadsheet which I will keep updated (you can find it pinned to my Twitter account), so if you want to check how my writing is going or when I'll next upload, you can see it there!
> 
> See you next chapter!
> 
> (Also always, come scream at me on Tumblr or Twitter, I'm _Hakuryen_ on both)


	7. Balançoire

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Here we are again, after a hiatus that went on for a bit longer than intended!  
> A little summary for what happened last:  
>  _Wolfie and Salieri had their little outing, chatting a bit, and our dearie thought he had found a new friend, only to discover that Salieri was ignoring him the next day. Disheartened, he decided not to push him; yet, when he wanted to do some private training a little while later, he stumbles upon Salieri doing exactly the same thing - to his dismay, he sees the other danseur fall and hit his knee in frustration. Was it just a one-time thing, or did he have to worry about Salieri? Nannerl advises Wolfie to come back to the training rooms some other time, to see if he'd find Salieri pushing himself again._
> 
> Updates will come more regularly now; but for now - 
> 
> Enjoy!

For all that he wanted to heed his sister's suggestion, he just didn't have the _time_.

With the debut of their first production in this company coming ever the closer, Wolfgang found himself whipped around between morning classes, private and joint practice sessions, costume fitting and communal warming down sessions at the end of his day.

His days were filled with ever the same tones, ever the same moves, ever the same people, yet he couldn't move his ass towards the one person he wanted to hear. Instead, he put his heart into what he had and made it count, pushing his body to the point of tearing so that it could grow back stronger time after time again. And when he wasn't doing that, he took care to not let his friends feel neglected, or his sister who was eyeing him with what could either be concern or apprehension half of the time.

So, between all the hustle and bustle that his life suddenly became, finally getting a moment to catch his breath made the extra influx of oxygen go straight to his head and let him fly against the ceiling with boredom. Wolfgang usually knew what to do with himself when he had free time, but after such a long stretch where he barely had any time or energy to even _think_ about what he'd like to do instead right in that moment, he suddenly felt uprooted. Hence him lying on the sofa on the afternoon of his first full day off in a little while, having Netflix droning on in the background and taking silly selfies, adorning them with the most ridiculous filters.

And then, suddenly, it hit him.  
"Antonio!" he shouted and abruptly sat up, accidentally throwing his phone to the floor.

"I sure hope this wasn't you doing something dirty and thinking about him," Nannerl called out from the kitchen with a tone that made it clear that she was only joking. "Did you just remember that you wanted to check if you'd catch him practising again?"  
"Yes! Why didn't you remind me?" He sprang up and made his way over to the entrance to put on shoes and a jacket.

"I thought you'd like to have a quiet day in for once."  
Abruptly, he halted. "Nannerl, have I ever voluntarily had a quiet day in my whole life?"  
"I mean, your and my definitions of quiet are probably quite diffe-"  
"Damn right. Now excuse me, I got to go. See you later, don't wait up for me!" And then he was gone.

His journey to the company's building had an uneven pace, what with him not being able to decide whether he should take it at a nice stroll or by power-walking. Did he want to get to the studio as quickly as possibly, suspense keeping him dangling, or to drag out the eventual fall as much as possible? Would Antonio be there or not, and if yes … what should Wolfgang even say?  
_'Hey, uh, so I know we've barely talked but I've got this stupidly huge crush on you and recently I noticed you pushing yourself too far and unhealthily and that's not alright. Please don't hate me.'_

Because, yea, right. He might as well sign it with ' _What do you say?'_ and three boxes labelled _'Oh sun to my moon, of course you are right, now come here and let me kiss you silly'_ , _'Thanks for being concerned, but – what the fuck you nutter?'_ and _'This is none of your business, now leave me alone you stalker'_.

As nervous as he was, he might as well make the last box extra large so that Antonio couldn't even miss it, and then he'd top it all off with his formal signature and a sticker.

Fuck, he didn't even have paper on him. And – what was he even thinking, of course he wouldn't write him a note, he'd solve this like an adult. Namely, by just avoiding the manner completely and issuing a complaint with his superiors.

A strangled laugh wrangled itself from his throat and he had half a mind to send Nannerl his thoughts, if only because he knew she'd expertly calm him down like the good sister she was.

But this was his battle to fight, and as impolitely as he had shaken her off before leaving he didn't deserve her council. He'd have to buy her an apology-cake later.

Sooner than he would've liked (or later?), he arrived at the company. It being a sunday, he had to let himself in through one of the side-doors and then he just … stood there.

Where would he even begin to search? The last times he had only happened upon the other dancer by chance and when the building was completely deserted. But he knew that dancers often came to push some extra-practice in during the day-hours on Sunday from what he had heard others tell, and he couldn't just go around banging open doors to see who's inside. He was pretty sure that Salieri wouldn't take one of the rooms with windows to the corridor again if he knew that other people were in the building. So he began walking along the rooms that he knew were favoured for practices by Cavalieri and Rosenberg, before it hit him.

His idiot brain hadn't thought to remember that he could literally hear the music through the doors. All he had to do was walk along the doors and keep an ear open for Antonio's solo music.

So like that he shuffled through the floors, looking like an elephant in the china store, lost and not even dressed for dancing.

The longer he crept through the halls, the more his hope (or dread?) fell and he was close to giving up by the time he reached the top-floor of this wing which was nigh deserted, before he heard it.

The faintest tones of the _Pas de Trois_ reached his ears and, excited, he quickened his pace and followed the ever louder-growing music until he stood in front of the door of its origin.

Before even stopping to think, he ripped it open and was instantly faced with Antonio, who had startled out of his dancing and was staring at him. He was also confronted with the reality of him having neither an excuse nor any clue what to say.

"...Hey," he finally pressed out. Good enough.

Antonio only nodded, breathing heavily. Wolfgang could see that his shirt was completely drenched in sweat, barely an inch dry, and that his hair was in a wild disarray of a bun, while his expression and posture spoke of pure exhaustion. And suddenly, Wolfgang was all business.

"How long have you been here for?" His face devoid of his usual cheer, instead pressed into concerned folds, he stared at Antonio, who seemed to have noticed his sudden change of demeanour and was staring back at him with a deliberate blank mien.

"A bit."  
"Antonio, for how long? You don't look like you've only been here for half an hour or so." Wolfgang knew Antonio's schedule, knew that it had been as packed as his own for the past few weeks. And if the other danseur practiced in his free time in the past few weeks too then .. he really should use this rest day. But Antonio didn't answer, merely closing off more and beginning to gather his things together. Resolutely, Wolfgang cemented his guard in front of the door so that he couldn't escape.

"I have seen you practise here at night, alone, a while ago," he began, hoping that the other man would listen to him. "I know you're practising way too much and that you push yourself to the point of hurting – I, I saw you hit your knee that one day." A deep, shaky breath, and a quiet continuation. "This is not healthy, Antonio."

"Who are you, my mother?" It hurt Wolfgang to hear Antonio so bitter, and to know about his past in connection with this sentence, and he watched as the man stuffed his speakers into his sports bag. "This is none of your concern, I don't know why you even bother."  
"I care about you." There it was, he had said it. "And I don't want you to get hurt any more."  
This seemed to have stupefied Antonio out of his one-track bullheadedness, and, halting in his movements, he stared up at Wolfgang from where he was crouching in front of his bag.

"We – we've barely talked," he finally whispered and his voice sounded so meek that Wolfgang wanted to encase him in his arms to shield him from the world.

"And the time we had to talk convinced me that you're an amazing man that I'd like to get to know better. Somebody I'd want … I'd _like_ to befriend if only he didn't close himself off from me!"  
"What do you mean?"  
"What do _I_ mean? Antonio, I've wanted to talk to you since that night so much, but you kept ignoring me!" At this, said man let himself fully fall to the ground to sit beside his bag and, knowing that he was no longer in danger of being run-out on, Wolfgang moved towards him sat before Antonio.

"... I thought you wouldn't want to have anything to do with me anymore afterwards?"  
"Antonio, think hard about it. Did my behaviour that night in any way indicate me being averse to you?"  
"...No?"  
"There you go. So why would I not want to be your friend."  
"No one else wants to." And he looked so resigned saying this, as if it was a given that he had come to terms with. "Only – only Aloysia. But she is envied, so she gets avoided too."

"Well, I very well want to," Wolfgang insisted again. "So, please, talk to me. Why do you do this to yourself? All this … all of this training, and the hitting yourself. Was that only the once?"  
"I'd like to be your friend too," Antonio murmured and Wolfgang felt like he could explode from happiness so much he had to restrain himself from shooting through the ceiling just so that he could listen to what Antonio would say next, because he was obviously struggling with what to to say.

"And I … Please, don't tell anybody about this. But – last year, when the season was well underway, I mis-stepped, badly. Landed wrong coming out of a jump, had to get surgery and all that. It took me over eleven months to heal, I only came back at the same time you joined the company. And I know that I'm really out of practice, and Rosenberg wouldn't even give me one main role yet, so I have to practise as much as possible to catch up with everyone else. To get back the position I had before."

Wolfgang hadn't expected the stream of words that suddenly sprang from Antonio's mouth and had to take a moment to process everything.

"Don't worry, nothing of this will leave this room." That was a good way to start, right? "But .. tell me. Your knee isn't fully healed yet, right? At least it didn't look that way to me."  
"It … is fully healed, technically. I've just got problems with it when doing certain moves, or putting too much weight on it at once." At this, he prodded at his leg as if expecting input from it. Wolfgang reached for his hand to keep him from doing it.

"This sounds like it's not completely fine yet to me. And do you think that you can show your best when you're not at your full potential?"  
"...No?" For the first time that afternoon, Antonio looked like he was seriously doubting his own actions.

"There we go." Wolfgang gave him a full smile, his eyes squeezed together under his happiness that Antonio was seeing reason and not pushing him away. "I'm sure that if you don't put this much stress on your knee anymore, you will soon grow better and better, simply because you're more at ease. I understand that you probably don't want to give up training altogether, but … please, don't train alone anymore. Just in case something happens again, or to let that somebody stop you when it's becoming too much." At this, he squeezed Antonio's hand once more before moving to let it go. But Antonio held on.

"Why don't you stay with me then?"

And, oh, his heart. A thousand supernovas had erupted inside of him at once, a myriad of golden chariots pulling his feelings to soar up high in the sky. He hadn't thought his smile could get any wider, and in joy he let his other hand join the one that was already holding Antonio's.

"Antonio, thank you so much for trusting me with this! But, as your trusted ballet spotter I'm going to have to put an end to today's training, you've already gone too far on a day that's supposed to be your rest-day." He took care to add a playful lilt to his voice, so that he wouldn't accidentally offend the other man.

"Alright." Well, that was easy. "But … I don't know what to do with myself otherwise."  
"What do you mean?" A confused tilt of his head. "Don't you ever do anything but work, train, eat and sleep?"  
"I mean … I read when I'm too tired to practise or work out. But I don't feel like being still just yet."  
Deep in thought, Wolfgang stared at him for a few moments.

"We really need to get you some hobbies, Antonio. For now … would you like to spend the rest of the day together?" And, Christ, Antonio was really out to kill him with that smile he just threw at Wolfgang.

"I'd love to."

"Amazing! Now, let's get you changed first. You smell like old trainers and will probably get a cold if you don't dress in something warmer and, especially, _drier_."  
Antonio wasn't even offended, simply nodding and climbing to his feet so that he could pick up his bag with one hand and Wolfgang with the other. A vacant changing room was quickly found, and Wolfgang spent the time that Antonio needed to take a shower idly scrolling through his phone. He quickly got to the bottom of his news feed, though, since he had basically spent all of his day looking through his social media out of boredom. So he put his phone done and took a look around this room he had never been in; it mirrored their usual changing room with its pale yellow walls, navy to black lockers and old wooden benches that had probably existed since before the company was founded – and when his eyes had had enough of the room, they fell on Salieri's half-open bag.  
And then he saw it.  
The bottom of the near-empty bag held only a few things, the speaker he had seen before, some ballet essentials and personal belongings, and there, squeezed into the corner, was a single knee bandage. Affronted, Mozart pulled it out and held it between his hands until Antonio stepped out from the shower room, dressed in everyday clothing and with hair freshly blowdried, his practice-clothes held in one hand as the other stroked over his stubble. A second later, the man also took stock of Wolfgang and halted in his step.

"Are you supposed to wear this?" Wolfgang asked straight-away, not beating around the bush.

"Yes."  
"Then why aren't you?"  
"Because I don't want to show weakness." And that wrangled an exasperated laugh from Wolfgang's lips.

" _Show weakness?_ Antonio, we're ballet dancers, not knights! No one's going to think less of you for taking care of yourself! Besides, why aren't you wearing them in your private practice then, when nobody else sees you?" When the black-haired man had nothing to say about that, Wolfgang put his head into his hands. "You're too damn stubborn for this world, I swear to god." And then he spoke up more so that Antonio could hear him loud and clear. "You're going to wear it every time you dance ballet from now on until your knee has gotten better. No excuses."

And then he put the bandage back into the bag, leant back and crossed his arms, showing Antonio that he'd accept no discussion on the matter and watching as the man simply nodded and walked over to him so that he could put everything into his bag and shrug on his jacket.

"So, where are we going?" Antonio then asked, and Wolfgang blinked at him a few times, caught in a stupor. Once his brain finally caught on to the lack of resistance from Antonio and to what he was asked instead, though, he quickly found an answer.

"I haven't been to the Prater even once since moving here! Can you take me? Pretty please?" He even went all the way, putting his hands together in a sign of begging and pushing his bottom lip forwards to form a pout. But this game could be played by two, and he watched happily as Antonio joined his charade, pretending that it was a hard choice to make in a playful manner, before he finally nodded and presented Wolfgang with a small smile.

"Sure, why not. I haven't been too often either, though, so don't expect me to know my way around."  
  


 

Chatting amicably, they soon left the company building and made their way towards their destination, crossing that bridge they had first held a proper conversation on on that evening, and entering the park the Prater was situated in. Wolfgang could already see the ferris-wheel from far away and immediately remembered that picture he had seen of Stephanie kissing Lorenzo on the cheek in front of it. And if his cheeks grew red at the idea of him and Antonio doing the same – so what? A man was allowed to dream.

The Prater itself was well-visited, but thankfully not too fully packed either, it being a Sunday afternoon in the peak-season. Wherever he looked, stalls with games and food beckoned the fair-goers. Most of the staff in these booths where teenagers or young adults (younger than he was, at least) earning some pocket-money in their free time.

"What should we do first?" he wondered aloud.

"Before you get any ideas, I should tell you that no amount of horses could drag me on any ride," Antonio said in the most deadpan voice that made Wolfgang giggle.

"Aw Antonio, are you a scaredy-cat?"  
"I'm pretty sure people have died on roller coasters, Wolfgang."  
"But that's where all the thrill comes from!"  
At this, Antonio promptly halted in his step and stared at him incredulously. "This just makes me seriously wonder how you managed to stay alive for this long. And my point stands – I will not go more than ten feet within these things, and neither will you as long as you're under my watch."  
"What about the kiddy merry-go-rounds?"  
"... I don't even know if you're joking anymore."

At this, Wolfgang began dragging Salieri into walking again, looking around to see what they could do. "I'm only kidding, Antonio. Was with the thrill, too; I value my life very much, I'd never go on a ride of which I didn't know that it was safe. Now, let's see what else there is to do except for stuffing our faces."  
Then he suddenly grew conscious of them. The many couples walking around on dates, holding hands, enjoying the nice afternoon, just as the both of them were doing.  
Except for – oh, God, _was_ this a date? Did Antonio think it was? Did _Wolfgang_ think it was one?  
He didn't want their first date to be bad, what was typical dating stuff to do on fairs?  
His first idea was shooting games; after all it was often seen in romantic movies that the boy would expertly win his girlfriend a big teddy or something, and with it, her heart. Right?  
So he dragged the man towards the first shooting game booth he could find and bought himself three tries. This one shouldn't be too bad – better than the stands where you had to shoot stuff with toy rifles, at least – the goal being to shoot down as many tin cans as you could with the bought shots. Easy.  
In theory.

Antonio watched with amusement written clear on his face as Wolfgang's first ball flew high over the pyramid of cans, him having overestimated the weight of the balls.

His second shot actually hit the pyramid, to his relief, but only took down the topmost can.

Heart pounding in his chest, he clutched the last ball to his chest and gave it a short peck, for luck.

Only for it to sail over the pyramid again – going through where the tip once used to be.

Crestfallen, he let his head sag down and exhaled deeply. It'd be no use buying new shots – his honour had already been soiled, who would want a gift that had been won in such disgrace?  
Before he knew it, Antonio was pushing in beside him under the stand, leaning forwards to buy his own three shots for the keep.

"Don't be so sad, Wolfgang, I'm not good at these games either. See?" And then he intentionally threw the balls so that they would miss the second, whole, pyramid by a far shot, his bad acting skills not masking what he did the least bit.

Still, it cheered Wolfgang up that the other man would go to such lengths just to not see him sad, and he gave him a thankful smile as Antonio was already turning around to step back into the throng of people outside the stand. He was just about to go after him when the shop-keep caught his attention.

"Hey, you." He caught him by the sleeve. "You still shot down one can. Here, you can choose a prize from this box." And then he pointed said box out to him, filled to the brim with tiny gimmicks. What caught his eyes first was the small collection of plastic rings, and on a whim he grabbed one of them – it was of a pretty sea-blue, with navy glitter on its surface – and smiled at the man before he turned around to follow Antonio, stuffing the small item into his pocket.

 

 

They spent quite a while walking around the Prater, visiting small booths here and there, Wolfgang buying some things for his sister, and snacking on the various things that caught their fancy. It didn't take them long until they came across the ferris-wheel and for Antonio to stop in front of it, catching him by surprise.

"You know, in all the years I've lived here, I've never been on the ferris-wheel," he told him, and let Wolfgang, who was taking that as his cue, drag him towards it.

There was a small queue in front of it which they patiently endured, and soon they were seated alone in one of the small gondolas.

The day was pretty warm, with only a small breeze going through their hair, and Wolfgang lounged in his seat, listening attentively as Antonio pointed out buildings and sights they could see from their vantage point. As they reached the top, Wolfgang could even vaguely make out their company building in the distance.

"You know, this would've been much prettier had we taken this ride at sunset or night," Antonio broke the silence that had sprung from the both of them just enjoying the view.

"Much more _romantic_ you mean?" Wolfgang grinned at him, meant to be joking, yet at the same time something took a jab at his heart. Antonio's following answer only twisted the knife even more.

"Why, Wolfgang, are you proposing to me?" He had not expected the black-haired danseur to join into his joking around, had not expected the soft wrinkles around the man's smiling eyes to hit him so hard, and breathlessly he closed his hand around the plastic ring in his pocket. Up to now he had forgotten about it. But … it had clearly been a sign, hadn't it? So he didn't think about it long, just went on his knee as much as the small gondola space allowed it and closed both of his hands around the ring in imitation of a ring box. Struggling to keep his nervous grin contained and his serious facade in place as he looked at Antonio's aghast expression, he spoke:  
"Antonio Salieri. Greatest primo ballerino Vienna has ever seen, best of the best, vanquisher of the most unbearable instructors and conqueror of my heart – Will you be my friend?" And then he opened his hands to reveal his 'proposal ring'.  
Antonio's eyes had grown ever the wider during his little speech, but as Wolfgang had let the last words drop from his lips, he barked a laugh and held his left hand out for Wolfgang to slip the ring on.  
"I'd like nothing more, Wolfgang," he whispered fondly and Wolfgang could only imagine what his face looked like, as he was now looking down at his hand, trying to put his ring on the man's ring finger but it not fitting, so he just slipped it on his pinky instead.

Proud of himself, he looked up again and saw his smile mirrored widely on Antonio's own lips.

_This would be the perfect moment for a kiss,_ he thought.

He sat back.

They spent the short remainder of the ride in silence, Wolfgang watching in happiness as Antonio played with the ring on his finger, neither of their smiles having abandoned them.

 

 

After they got off the ride, Antonio and he bought something to eat on the go, night coming ever the closer and convincing them to slowly make their way back home.

It happened that they came upon that pedestrian bridge again, and Wolfgang already expected this to be the end of their outing; after all, Antonio lived on the other side of the Danube, having gone into the opposite direction than him the last time they had been there.  
Yet, the man made no move to depart from Wolfgang and together, they walked to exactly the point they had sat that evening and, as if in silent agreement, let themselves fall to the ground there again, their legs dangling through the gaps in the balustrade and their hands holding their food.

Antonio was much more relaxed and talkative that day than Wolfgang had expected - and secretly he hoped that the man was like that only with him - so their conversation flowed freely and carried them deep into the day.

Antonio didn't yet reveal much about himself, but neither did Wolfgang, and just hearing small stories and opinions of the man made him content to sit there and just .. talk.

And, as he looked over the Danube that was now painted in the colours of the sunset and soon after starry bright, listening to the soft baritone of Antonio's words, Wolfgang felt happy. He didn't need romantic gestures on ferris-wheels.

As long as he had this, everything was perfect.

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Comments, reviews, and bookmarks still greatly appreciated as always!
> 
> Come chat with me on Twitter or Tumblr - Hakuryen on both ~


	8. Allegro

**Notes for the Chapter:**

>  **Terms for this chapter:**  
>  Port de bras - arm movement while dancing  
> Fouetté - a quick whipping movement of the raised leg in ballet usually accompanying a pirouette. This is mentioned in this chapter as a reference to Odile's famous 32 fouettés at the end of her pas de deux with Prince Siegfried in Swan Lake. Look it up, it's truly impressive.  
> Ranks in the company - principal dancers always get leading roles; soloists get nameless characters that don't play big roles, but have solos; corps (corps de ballet) are the "body" of the ballet, they dance in big groups (see: the swans in Swan Lake)

Nannerl was still waiting up for him when he finally got home, a big mug of tea in her hands and some mindless Netflix-show on the telly, looking at him concernedly until she saw the look on his face.

"I'm assuming it went well?" she then asked him with smiling creases around her tired eyes, lifting the blanket she was buried under so that he could snuggle in against her.

"The best." He gladly leant into her arms and barely spared the show a second glance as she muted it. "He was training again, and I caught him and we talked it out a bit." Should he tell her what exactly Antonio had told him? It felt like a breach of privacy, like he was betraying the trust the other man had put in him, and even if it was his sister he wouldn't break the fragile bond they had formed only that day, sealed with a plastic ring. "I convinced him to do no more training today and he agreed to spending the day with me, so we went to the Prater together - which reminds me, here, all of this is for you – where we went around the booths and took a ride on the big ferris-wheel! It was really pretty, you and Constanze should go too. Or the both of us could go if you'd like."   
Wolfgang was just about to mention the ring, but something kept him from it. Yes, he had only recently pondered over how he had drifted away from Nannerl without noticing, and how he didn't want to keep anything from her anymore. But … this felt so private, and childish, and like it had all been a dream. This whole afternoon and evening was feeling like a dream, and he was scared to find out that it was just that, _a dream_ , and that the whole bubble would burst if he only mentioned the ring. It made no _sense,_ even to him, but .. this was his, and it would stay so until he was on more even ground, until this ring didn't feel like an aerial hoop that was the only thing keeping him from falling. He'd like to have a safety net first.

They stayed up a bit longer, chatting at first and then resuming watching the show, Wolfgang slowly getting into the plot but soon feeling too tired to keep his eyes open for much longer.

So, with a last hug, he went to bed; yet another secret pushing hard on his lungs.

But, oh, this breathlessness made him feel airy.

 

 

Their training resumed the next day. But first came their usual one-and-a-half hour morning class, and Wolfgang hadn't been this excited for it since their first day in the company.

This time, he didn't risk taking any chances by allowing Antonio to take the lead and instead took the reins into his own hands; so, his mind set on his decision, he put his things next to Antonio's usual place in the changing room. Hannes' and Stephanie's weird expressions when they entered the room soon after were swiftly ignored, but he couldn't do the same with Antonio's when he eventually pushed through the door.

His brows were drawn together in confusion and for just a second, Wolfgang's heart dropped down into his pants, _Oh shit, I messed up,_ already coursing through his mind.  
But then Antonio smiled.

And he didn't hesitate in walking up to Wolfgang, letting his sports bag fall with a soft "Hey" before he took out his workout gear to go change in one of the stalls. Wolfgang himself was already dressed and beaming as he waited, ignoring the incredulous gazes of some of the other danseurs and happily humming any tunes that sprung to his mind. It was purely by coincidence that his eyes fell upon the knee bandage in Antonio's bag again, and gingerly, he reached for it.   
The firm fabric felt coarse between his fingers, the padded bit in its middle just the right thickness, giving him no doubt that this was top-notch quality. Only the best for Antonio.

Why shouldn't he wear it?  
So, when the man came out not long after to join Wolfgang again, he simply held the bandage out to him and lifted his eyebrows with as much meaning behind them as he could muster.

To his relief, Antonio didn't even question him or argue, simply taking it off him and letting himself fall on the bench beside him so that he could stick his leg through it until it fit snugly over his knee.

The black fabric of the bandage nearly matched the tone of his leggings, making the two objects barely discernible.

"There. This bad?" Wolfgang smiled at him, patting his shoulder and standing up, waiting for Antonio to follow him.

"Bearable," he got a deadpan answer, making him laugh shortly, before the both of them grabbed their warm-up materials and made their way to the practice room. On their way out, Hannes caught him by the arm, causing Wolfgang to mime to Antonio that he should go ahead without him.

"So, are you friends with him now?" the other man asked him, Stephanie beside him with a concerned look on his soft features.

"Yea!" he beamed, his smile growing dimmer when he noticed that they didn't look happy for him. "But don't worry, you're still my friends just as much!" Only that he didn't have any romantic interest in them. But what they didn't know wouldn't hurt them.

"That's … that's not why we're concerned," Stephanie mumbled, arms crossed and eyes flitting nervously between Hannes and Wolfgang. "It's just … none of us know how Salieri really is. We're simply worried that he's no good for you."  
At this, Wolfgang felt a small bout of anger quell up in him, but he quickly repressed it. His friends were being ignorant, they didn't know better, being angry at them was unjustified. Still, he couldn't keep the hardness out of his answer.

"Seeing as I'm the only one who actually bothered to try and talk to him and to get to know him, I think I'm the better judge of that."   
He waited for a second in case they had anything else to say, but their stunned silence alone spoke a thousand words, and he left them behind.

 

 

The practice room was only about half filled so far, and Wolfgang happily waved at Nannerl and Constanze on his way to Antonio, beside whom Aloysia was already doing stretches with a pink Theraband. She lifted a perfectly sculpted eyebrow at him.  
"Do either of you mind if I work beside you today?"  
Her second eyebrow joined the first, but Antonio nodded so she mirrored him.

"What owes us the pleasure?" she asked, still diligently doing her stretches while Antonio and Wolfgang hadn't even begun theirs yet.

"Antonio and I are friends now," Wolfgang chirped in answer and let himself fall to the floor so that he and Aloysia were now bracketing Antonio but could still look at each other comfortably. "And it'd be rude of me not to show interest in his other friends. Besides that, I've really admired you since coming here. Your _port de bras_ is breathtaking, and your general discipline! I saw a video of you doing the _fouettés_ as Odile – simply stunning! You truly are a prima ballerina, I don't even know how you and Antonio haven't got a better international reputation. They're sleeping on you."  
For a few silent seconds, she only blinked at him, finally having halted in her stretching, and he could hear a soft snort from Antonio's direction.

"That's how he got me too," he broke her out of her stupor and, to Wolfgang's joy, a soft smile appeared on her face.

"I like you, you can stay." And then she went back to stretching, the other two men taking that as their sign to start themselves.

"By the way," Wolfgang squeezed through his restricted airways. "Do you two mind exchanging your numbers and social media with me?"

"Sure," the both of them answered in unison and it took them barely a minute to get everything sorted out, which was all the time they had before Rosenberg entered the room and loudly cleared his throat at them having their phones out at a time they should be focusing on their work.

It was only because of that that Wolfgang caught the man's pleased expression at seeing Antonio wear his bandage. In a flash, he remembered the stern gazes he had seen the instructor give the other danseur – so the reason for them were Antonio's lack of self-care? That idiot.

Which reminded him …

"Antonio." He bumped his shoulder against his and waited for an affirmative hum. "Will you train alone again this evening?"  
"I planned to, yes."  
"Nuh-uh." Another bump. "It's not good for your body to train this soon before bed-time only to wake up and have another training session in morning class and even more afterwards. How about you put in new training sessions even earlier in the morning, before class? Our class is always quite late so you'd probably still get enough sleep, and like this you can relax in the afternoons. In fact, would you like to relax with me again?"

The stretch Antonio was currently doing must've been difficult, as the next hum he gave sounded strained.

"Nice! We'll chat during the day then to see about when and where to meet up. Now, we should probably concentrate again, Rosenberg is already throwing daggers at us."

 

 

Class went by quickly after that, Wolfgang lulled into ease by the familiar rhythms and movements of a typical morning class session, and on their way out he was again stopped by Hannes and Stephanie. Antonio and Aloysia were already on their way to god-knows-where, their schedule allowing them to have some free time, so they didn't notice him missing. Before Wolfgang could even grow annoyed in preparation for another lecture, Hannes spoke up.

"Wolfgang, we wanted to apologise." He herded them over to the side so that they wouldn't block the corridor. "You were right, it wasn't right of us to judge somebody without ever having properly talked to him, which is as much our fault as it is his. Please – we want to make it up to you, and you are still our friend. Maybe Salieri – Antonio – can be so too, we'd like to try. A new beginning, per se. We and a few others are going to my father's pub this evening, nothing that will become too late or involve too much alcohol, after all we've still got work tomorrow. We've already invited your sister and Constanze. So I'm asking you now, and if you'd like to you can invite Antonio too. We'd love to get to know him better."  
Wolfgang's smile had grown ever the wider the more Hannes said, and by the end of his short speech he was practically shaking with joy.   
"Thank you so much guys," he beamed. "Sorry I was a bit snappish, but I actually really like Antonio so that hit me in the wrong place. But it wasn't fair of me, because I really like the both of you too and you just didn't know better." He followed with a hug for the both of them before quickly excusing himself. Rosenberg would have his head if he was late for practice.

 

 

~*~

 

 

Antonio's day in the company went by much quicker than he would've liked it to; the prospect of an evening without any extra training was making him skittish, and the fact that he hadn't yet heard from Wolfgang only more so.

He was just in the process of warming up for his last private session with Rosenberg – he had had another one earlier that day with Cavalieri and a few other dancers – when his phone (which he may or may not have had close-by with him for the past few hours, just to miss nothing) vibrated and displayed a new message by Wolfgang. Not leaving his stretch, he reached for it and unlocked the screen to have a look at it.  
 _Hey Antonio!! Would you like to meet up after work and spend some time together?_ Followed by a plethora of smileys.

_Sure_ , he typed back.

_Cool, thx! We can decide what exactly we'd like to do later, but Hannes has invited us to his father's pub this evening if you'd like to go? OO_

He didn't get a chance to type his answer, as Rosenberg was already stepping into the room and walking towards him.

"I saw that you finally started wearing your bandage," he greeted him. "That's good. Now, do you feel stretched enough?"  
A nod, and they started.

 

 

Sweaty, but happy with the session, Antonio left studio 12 two hours later and promptly came face-to-face with Wolfgang. Surprised, but not unpleasantly so, he came to a halt and smiled at the blond dancer.   
"Hey there," Wolfgang greeted him. "You didn't answer, but I figured you were busy? You've still got time to decide if you'd like to go the pub, since that's only later in the evening. For now – would you like to visit Nannerl's and my flat? She's still busy with work for a little while and we could just hang out. Only if you'd like to, of course."

Wolfgang sounded almost sheepish, which was cute, and his reaction to Salieri's nod was even more so.

"Cool! I'm already changed but I can wait in the changing room while you get ready?"  
So they went to their usual changing room, chatting a bit but mostly swaying in comfortable silence, and Salieri grabbed his normal clothes and a towel so that he could take a short shower, lest he walked around reeking of dance floor polish and sweat all day.

With that taken care of and hidden from any curious eyes, he gingerly unfolded his clothes. Nestled inside his t-shirt lay the ring Wolfgang had given him just the day before, a chain pulled through its middle so that he could wear it more comfortably around his neck. He put it on, the sea-blue in stark contrast with his pale skin above his heart, but not to be seen anymore once he put on his shirt again and, after that, the rest of his clothing.

Wolfgang was playing around on his phone when he came back out again, smiling at Salieri once he noticed that he was done, throwing his phone into his own bag and himself to his feet and, soon after that, they had left the company building and begun their journey to Wolfgang's flat.

"It's not that big," he warned him as they walked up the stairs, "and a bit messy, sorry. We haven't cleaned up in a few days."

"It's alright," Salieri reassured him and watched curiously as Wolfgang unlocked the wooden door and opened the gate to another realm. Their home was … homely. Much more welcoming than Salieri's, at least, which functioned more as a necessity than as a comfort to him, and it looked way more lived in too. Memorabilia were scattered all around the shelves, pictures and certificates of the Mozart siblings hanging on the walls, ranging from them in their first ballet flats to just a few months ago, and the occasional personal unshared belonging caught his eye here and there. A big window with a window sill big enough to sit on faced the city, obviously well-used as he could see an old mug and some books laying on top of it.

Wolfgang's home made him feel as much at ease as the man himself did.

"Hmm, what should we do …," said man mumbled to himself, toeing off his shoes and letting his bag fall next to the kitchen door. Just a second later, he crossed the threshold into said room and crept over to the fridge. "I'm kinda of hungry but we'll probably have dinner together later, whether we go to the pub or not -" and then, louder: "Hey, Antonio? Are you in the mood for baking? I crave sweets."  
"... Sure? Do you have the ingredients for whatever you have in mind?"  
"I think so. Nannerl impulse-bought cupcake paper forms recently so we could do that? Let me look up a recipe."  
A quick google search and some measuring later, Antonio was doing his best to whisk together the ingredients while warding off Wolfgang's sneaky hands at the same time ("Stop trying to steal the dough, you'll get salmonella." "Oh come on, that's such a myth!") when the front door clicked open once more and Wolfgang jumped down from his perch on the counter, running out of the kitchen like a puppy wanting to greet its returning owner, not noticing that Antonio had frozen.   
He hadn't even thought of what he would do when Wolfgang's sister eventually came home. Had Wolfgang even asked if it was okay for him to invite somebody over? Was Antonio a guest or an intruder to her?  
He heard some muffled talking from the corridor, still not having broken out of his stance, and then an all too familiar woman with long locks was leaning around the doorway and looking at him.

And she was smiling. Oh thank god, she was smiling at him.  
"Hey there!" she greeted him, now fully stepping around the wall so he could see more than just her head. "We haven't talked yet, so nice to officially meet you. Most people call me Nannerl, but if you're more welcome with Maria then that's fine too." Then she blinked at the bowl and whisk he was holding. "Oh, the two of you are baking! Let me just take a shower and get changed really quick and then I'll join you."  
Wolfgang and she really _were_ similar. She was as bubbly as him, and made him feel at ease just as fast, and so it wasn't difficult for him to unfreeze and give an affirmative nod.

"Antonio Salieri. Pleased to meet you."  
And then she was gone, with Wolfgang taking her place to lean against the doorway, legs and arms crossed and smiling happily. "She likes you."  
"How would you know just from that? We barely talked."  
"Sibling-bond. We can read each other's mind." At this, he made jazz-hands before standing straight again and walking over to Antonio so that he could have a look at the dough.

"This looks about right, hm? Let me get out the forms so that we can put them in the oven."

The forms were baby-blue, with darker butterflies imprinted on them, and they managed to fill two trays of them with the dough that they had made. With the baking-process halfway done, Nannerl joined them again, having substituted her dancing gear with a soft skirt and a DIYed t-shirt that read "Best Sis in the World!!" in what Antonio assumed to be Wolfgang's handwriting, with little pictures, hearts and stars drawn all around it. It looked old, and faded, or maybe well-loved was a better word?  
Antonio averted his eyes.

The cupcakes were really beginning to look good.

As concentrated as he was on staring at the glass oven door, he couldn't follow the siblings with his eyes and just contented himself with listening to the soft rustling and clanking next to him instead.

„What are you looking for up there, Nannerl?“  
„My – god, I'll have to hide this again after – I've got some baking stuff up here.“ A soft grunt as she seemingly struggled with pulling something out of a high cupboard.

"Oh cool, what do you ha- We've got icing sugar?? And food-dye! Why didn't you tell me, I would bake more often."  
"Because you'd just mix up both of that with enough water to drink and call it a smoothie or something. I know you by now, Wolfie."  
"Okay, but can I eat some now?"  
"Of course I won't let you have pure sugar plain, god," and then, addressing Antonio: "Take care not to let him eat too much sweet stuff. He's already bad enough as it is."

And then she even _patted his hair_ as she walked by and stood beside him to mix up icing on the countertop. Bewildered, he broke his gaze from the cupcakes and looked up at her, probably looking like a dumb fuck but too confused to care.

Nannerl wasn't paying him any attention, but Wolfgang was looking at him over her shoulders, smiling as if he knew something Antonio didn't.

"Have you made up your mind by now? If you don't want to go to the pub we can just watch a video or take a walk."  
"Oh, do you mean the meetup in Hannes' father's pub?" Nannerl spoke up before Antonio himself could answer. "You should come! We're usually quite the big group so nobody will mind if you and Wolfie pair off. I mean, if you feel uncomfortable talking to the others."  
"I don't."  
She joined in in Wolfgang's secretive smile.

"But … okay. Why not."

 

 

About two hours later they stood in front of the pub, a box containing two thirds of the cupcakes that they had made in Nannerl's hands. Muffled music, voices and laughter reached their ears from inside the building and Antonio could see patrons through the windows and sitting at tables outside, talking amongst each other and to the occasional waiter. The building itself was old and timber-framed, standing in stark contrast towards the more modern buildings in the vicinity, but holding all the more charm for it.

Giving him no chance to change his mind, Nannerl lead them through the front door and into the pub, steering towards a big table at the back. They must've met up like this before, for her to be so sure of where to go.

The table itself was manned by many of the principal dancers in their morning class, Da Ponte the pianist and some other soloists and corps that Salieri didn't know, with Hannes and Stephanie sitting closest to where they were approaching, seeing them first and smiling.

Wolfgang called out a greeting, pulling the attention of the others on themselves.

Just a second later, Salieri was met with incredulous stares.

"Should I go?" He tried to convince himself that the tight feeling in his chest wasn't disappointment, already turning around to leave the establishment in a brisk pace, but a hand on each of his wrists kept him from it. He hadn't noticed that the siblings had come to bracket him between them.

Stirred by the sudden, if miniscule, movement from the trio, the table suddenly was in shambles. A chorus of reassurances that he could stay reached his ears, followed by everyone making space for the three of them.

Wolfgang and Nannerl gave him no time to second-guess himself, seating him between them on one of the three chairs that had just been pushed to the table for them so that he and Wolfgang were now sitting opposite Hannes and Stephanie.

"Hey guys," Wolfgang immediately spoke up, his bottom not even having hit the chair yet. "We did some baking before we came here. Who would like a cupcake?"  
  


 

The offering of sweets had immediately eased everyone into a more relaxed stance, Salieri himself indulging in one of them, and by the time they ordered dinner and refreshments he even found himself to feel more comfortable where he was. The fact that they were sitting so closely that he could feel Wolfgang and Nannerl pressed to him from shoulder to elbow, anchoring and soothing him, may have played a big fact in it.   
Hours went by, Salieri mostly keeping to himself (which was no surprise) but occasionally answering questions some of the other dancers had, to his astonishment even making them laugh a few times. What did surprise him, though, was how hyper-fixated Wolfgang was on him. He'd have thought that the blond would prefer chatting with the others on an outing such as this, and he did partake in some of the conversations, but for most of the time he was leaning into Salieri as if they were sharing secrets and quietly talked to him.

By the end of the evening he had no regrets for having joined the siblings in coming to the pub, and as they stood up he even smiled at the remaining group and waved a goodbye to them.

He and the siblings were already a few feet away from the table when Hannes called out to him.  
"Hey, Salieri!" He waited until Salieri had turned around to look at him. "You don't have to address us by our surnames, you know."  
It didn't even take him a second to set his mind on an answer. "You neither."

He left the pub smiling, and carried that smile all the way to where he parted from the siblings for the night, receiving a hug from each of them, and home into his bed, where it accompanied him into his dreams.

 


	9. Arrière

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> _"I can't improvise, I'm only good at dancing what I'm told."  
>  "Let my music tell you, then."_

**Notes for the Chapter:**

>  **Terms for this chapter:**  
>  Port de bras - arm movement while dancing  
> Pirouette - A non-traveling turn on one leg, of one or more rotations  
> Pas de deux - Lit. "step of two", a dance duet

He woke up to soft sunlight tickling his nose, and if he wasn't already smiling it might've put a new grin on his lips. A quiet sneeze wiggled itself out of him but he paid it no mind; since his alarm hadn't rung yet he intended to spend some more quiet-time in his bed, but then he remembered. He had promised Wolfgang to forego evening solo-practices and to instead squeeze in a bit of extra training before his morning classes. So if he still wanted to do that – and he knew that if he didn't he might hate himself a bit for it – he had to leave the comforting confines of his covers now and move his ass over to the company building.

So he did just that, quickly swapping out the exercise gear in his sports bag for fresh clothes and grabbing some breakfast for on the go.

It didn't surprise him that the company was near empty of any dancers, merely manned by administrative staff and caretakers, since most morning classes and practices didn't start until the late morning. So after getting changed he went to the room that they usually used for their morning class, and had to admit that now he really _was_ surprised to see Wolfgang already there, stretching on the floor and looking up at him as he opened the door.

"Good morning!" he smiled at Salieri, not moving out of his toe-touch stretch. "Did you sleep well?"

He hummed in affirmation and let his bag fall next to a wall so that he could sit close to the blond and start his own warm-up. "And you?"  
"Like a drunk baby." A soft grunt from him moving into the next stretch. "Let's have a look at your solo first and then you can review my solo ball scene?"   
"Sure."

They spent a few more minutes warming up, chatting amicably in the meantime, and then Salieri moved towards the middle of the room while Wolfgang sat down next to the speaker that he had brought and waited for Salieri's O.K. to play the music.

With how long Salieri had been practising his solo, the movements were well-ingrained into his muscle memory. By now he knew that his technique for the choreography was perfect, he missed no beats and got through the jumps just fine, even though he was a bit exhausted by the end of his sequence. Yet, something was missing. Theoretically, he knew that dance required emotion next to technique. Even with him putting in emotion, though, it just didn't feel _right_.

When he had finished dancing, Wolfgang simply looked at him. Salieri was already beginning to feel queasy once a few moments had gone by, until, finally, Wolfgang spoke his mind.  
"Antonio," he began, his voice soft. "Tell me, who is Benno to you?"  
Arms stemmed into his sides, still breathing heavily, it didn't even take him a second to think of his answer. "He's Siegfried's best friend."  
"Yes, but what's he like? What is his personality?"  
"He's charming, jovial, quick to liven up the party when Siegfried doesn't feel like it. He loves Siegfried dearly, just how is up to interpretation, and wants the best for him." Only a second later did it cross his mind that it was _Wolfgang_ who was dancing Siegfried and that the other man might take his statement weirdly. To his relief, the other danseur didn't focus on what he said last.

"Exactly. So why are you dancing so stiffly? Rigid and precise dancing is for serious characters. But Benno is youthful, and like you said charming and jovial, so your dancing should mirror that, no?"  
"...Yes, I know."  
"Why are you still dancing like you've got Rosenberg's foot up your ass then?"  
To this, he had no answer, but it didn't seem like Wolfgang expected any.

"Antonio," he instead said, his eyes intense. "When was the last time that you had fun while dancing?"

...Huh.

"Huh."

"Yeah, exactly. I tell you what, let's focus on that first. I figured you've only been focusing on the technique and perfection, as many dancers do, and yea maybe you're putting emotion into it but are you really having _fun_? So why don't you just … I'm going to play something, and you will improvise and just dance whatever moves you feel like. Have fun, live a little! I won't judge you."  
Now, the blond was beaming at him, but Salieri didn't find it in himself to smile back.  
"I can't improvise, I'm only good at dancing what I'm told."  
"Let my music tell you, then."

… What even. Wolfgang didn't even give him time to question his intentions, instead strutting to the piano in the corner of the room that was usually manned by Da Ponte and began playing a lovely tune without the help of any sheet music.  
"Whenever you're ready," he shouted after he had already played a few bars and Salieri hadn't yet begun dancing.

Salieri sighed. He still didn't think it'd even look remotely good, or that it would improve his performance of Benno, but Wolfgang seemed to think that it would and the least Salieri could do was at least try.

Shoulders drooping, he stood still for a few more seconds, thinking of what he could do, before he figured that he really should just listen to the music and do what felt right.

He started out with a few step sequences, patched together from pieces of old choreographies of his, before segueing into a first small, hesitant jump when Wolfgang played a few stronger notes. The music turned airier so Salieri began concentrating more on soft turns and _port de bras,_ and like this he kept going – listening for cues in the music, dancing what he felt fit most. It surely wasn't perfect, and probably looked chopped-up at times, but he truly _did_ have fun and after a small while, his brain just turned off and he allowed himself to just _be._ It was only by chance that he noticed the music becoming slower and quieter, and with some last flourishes he, too, came to a halt.

Wolfgang was beaming at him from his seat at the piano, and only when Salieri wanted to reciprocate it did he notice that he was already smiling. For how long he had been doing that, he didn't know, but it didn't bother him at all and neither did Wolfgang suddenly rushing at him to give him a crushing hug.  
"Can't improvise, he said! You humongous liar! That was so good, and was I right? Did you have fun?"  
"I did," he whispered back. "Your playing was breathtaking. What piece was that?"  
"One of my own. Yet to be titled."

They were still hugging so Wolfgang couldn't see Salieri's eyes growing comically wide, and he didn't know what to say to that, so he simply didn't say anything, just revelling in the comfort of the embrace instead.

"So," Wolfgang finally broke the silence and ended the hug that had probably gone for way too long. "Shall we try your solo again?"  
A nod, and they went back to the positions they had taken in at the beginning of their private training. The first notes echoed through the room, and remembering Wolfgang's wish to have more fun and to relax more, Salieri once more danced through the motions of his solo.

It was perfect. Even he couldn't deny that as he breathed heavily through his end-pose, Wolfgang's rapid-fire clapping thundering in his ears.

"Bravo, Antonio!" he laughed. "Truly the greatest Primo Ballerino to have ever graced this company's stage!"  
"Oh shut up." A grin, and barely a wince when he got up. His knee only gave a short pang, protected by his bandage, as it has been the day before. "Well then, let's see how you fare with your solo."  
  
  


The day commenced as normal after that, with the both of them dancing on until shortly before the morning class would start, and separating after that was over to pursue their own duties.

Antonio had lunch with Aloysia, who had just come out of her joint practice for Carmen Suite and would head towards another one with the rest of the main cast for Swan Lake after, while he'd go to physical therapy. When that was over, he went to his last session of the day – a joint practice session with some soloists and both Rosenberg and Cavalieri.

Over the course of two hours, they went through all of the Swan Lake choreographies Salieri was in and, by the end of it, he wasn't even feeling exhausted. Practicing with Wolfgang had really helped him out and, speaking of, - he could see said danseur watching him through the corridor windows, waving once Salieri noticed him. He smiled back at him in greeting and quickly finished his cool-down stretches, but before he could bolt for the door, Rosenberg held him up.

"Salieri," he said, voice clipped as always, and pulled him towards a secluded corner of the room. "I wanted to tell you that I'm very pleased with your performance today. Also, I will soon hang out the date for the dress rehearsal. I thought you'd like to know – anyway, I'll let you go now. See you tomorrow morning." And then, not even waiting for a reply, he left.

Well shit. If the dress rehearsal will be held soon, the opening night won't come much later. And the production will only be going on for a short amount of time, a season at the most, and after that it'd be back to the normal amount of ballet roles for the Mozart siblings and him. Would he even have time to meet up with Wolfgang outside of morning class?

This was not the time to crack open his head over it, though, seeing as Wolfgang was already waving more impatiently.

"Hey there!" the other man greeted him as soon as Salieri stepped out of the room. "What did Rosenberg want from you?"  
"He told me that he was happy with my dancing today." He couldn't hold back his smile at that. "And informed me that the dress rehearsal will soon be held."  
"That's amazing Antonio!" They began walking; where to, he did not know. "And oh yea, what does your costume look like?"  
"Not telling." All of the dancers had been called to the costuming department several times over the past few weeks so that the tailors could fit the costumes perfectly; in a sport such as ballet it was vital that everything fit as it was supposed to. They didn't try to hide any of the costumes from the dancers that came in, but the room was so stuffed with garments that one would need the devil's luck to correctly guess which one belonged to which character. "Actually, Wolfgang, would you mind if we did some more practising? I still feel really wired up, and I won't be able to sleep tonight with that much energy left."  
Still pouting, the blond began steering them into a different direction. "Well, if you won't tell me, I won't tell you either. But Nannerl has showed me hers, and a picture of Constanze's. Have you seen Aloysia's? She'll probably have to dance in a long dress, right?"

"I haven't seen hers, but the Queen Mothers usually do, yes. Do you know where we're going?"  
Wolfgang hummed and turned into a different corridor. "Our usual room. As long as you wouldn't like going somewhere else?"

Salieri shook his head, and a few silent minutes later they had arrived.

He and Wolfgang were still in their workout clothes, so they did a short joint warming-up and then Salieri watched as he walked towards his speaker and put on some instrumental music that Salieri didn't know. Confused, he looked up at him. "Aren't we doing our solos?"

"Nah," Wolfgang smiled and walked over to pull Salieri to his feet. "Let's just have some more fun! We did well today, especially you." And then he guided Salieri's hand over his own head and did I little _pirouette_ with his support before elegantly gliding away, going into a short jump and ending in an end-pose directed at Salieri. All in time with the rhythm of the music, of course.

Stumped, Salieri just stood there for a second, staring at the arm with which Wolfgang was pointing at him.

"Come on, Antonio!" Wolfgang finally pouted, impatient. "Dance-off!"  
"..Okay."

Figuring it'd be better to just go with the other man's whims, he mirrored Wolfgang's moves, making a few changes to them, forming them more into his own style, and ending in the same pose.

Beaming with happiness, Wolfgang lead into another, more difficult, sequence which was again changed and repeated by Salieri.

They kept going on like this for a while, getting ever the closer to each other, until finally Wolfgang began using him as a support for pirouettes and steps. Like this, their dancing-at-each-other evolved into a dancing-with-each-other, them improvising a _pas de deux,_ all while smiling at each other.

"The song ends in a bit," Wolfgang whispered to him while Salieri jokingly heaved him up in a little lift.

"We better come to an end then," Salieri murmured back and led Wolfgang into another pirouette and, figuring that he'd rather end early than miss the last beat, he let Wolfgang fall into a drop.

What he hadn't considered, though, was the momentum with which Wolfgang would come out of the pirouette and so he couldn't keep himself from stumbling and eventually loosing his footing, causing the both of them to fall to the ground, with Salieri bent slightly over Wolfgang.

Neither of them laughed, nor were they angry; they just stared at each other while the last tones of the music drifted by until at last that too lapsed into silence.

He could feel Wolfgang's breath on his own lips.   
Where they getting closer? He didn't know.

He – he didn't mind either.

Their lips were nearly touching, Salieri's eyelids nearly closed, when suddenly, a loud pop-song began blaring from the speakers.

Startled, Salieri scrambled away from Wolfgang and looked at the damned device in anger, before letting his gaze slide towards Wolfgang, who was still lying on the floor, dazedly looking up at the ceiling, one leg propped up.

"I think – I think I'd better head home now. Thanks for practising with me," Salieri stuttered.  
Without giving the man a chance to speak his own mind, he fled.

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> O shit waddup
> 
> .. as always, comments and kudos greatly fuel my writing exertions, and make any writer's day.
> 
> Come scream at me on Tumblr or Twitter, @Hakuryen on both.


	10. Entrechat

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> _"Never before in my life have I been so sure of something."_

"Isn't it ironic how it's begun to rain?"  
He was sitting on the living room window sill, alone, looking out over the city and its skies. Grey clouds were pressing in on him in agglomerating ramparts, shedding their tears on the concrete buildings, appropriately mirroring his emotions.  
"What are you being so dramatic for? It's barely drizzling," his sister's voice surprised him, making him wince where he sat, and accusingly he looked at her. He hadn't even heard her come back home.  
"I'm sad, thank you very much."  
She sat in front of him, handing him a cup of herbal tea that he usually hated so much. He took a sip. At least it was sweetened.

"What about? I thought you were meeting up with Antonio, usually you come back grinning like a Cheshire cat from those get-togethers."  
Just thinking back to it made him want to hide his face behind his hands in shame. Nearly, but only just nearly, had they shared a kiss. And his own stupid speaker, set on shuffle, had bursted their bubble and startled Antonio, scaring him away. Did – would Antonio even have wanted it?   
Maybe it had just been a spur-of-the-moment thing for him. Maybe … maybe Wolfgang had only imagined it? God, he hoped he had. That at least gave him an inkling of a chance of not having made their friendship awkward when it had only just begun to properly blossom.

He had had those exact thoughts earlier, too; when he had lain on the floor for several more minutes even after the other danseur left.

"We nearly kissed. I think." Pulling his legs further up from where he was leaning against the wall, he hid further behind his knees and the cup.

"Nearly?"  
"Yea. My speaker suddenly began playing another song, and he took off."  
"God, Wolfie, I'm so sorry ..."

"It's .. it's alright, I guess." A forced laugh. "Enough about me. How was your evening with Constanze?"  
Nannerl's obviously concerned gaze didn't leave his face for a few seconds, but she thankfully seemed to sense that he needed some distraction. "She showed me some of her Coppelia choreography, and you wouldn't believe what some of the soloists she works with have told her about Cavalieri ..."  
  


**  
~*~**

 

 

The days went by.

At first, the morning after their nearly-but-not-quite-kiss, Salieri had been nervous about how Wolfgang would treat him. Would he finally receive karmic payback for having ignored the blond only a few weeks ago, by being discarded in return? Maybe Wolfgang had already told everyone about what had happened – dragged Salieri's name through the mud, not giving him the chance to ever clear it again. But, no, he wouldn't do that. The man was way too nice for that, even if it was in retribution for Salieri having nearly taken advantage of him.

God.

One good thing had finally flown his way and he couldn't even manage to restrain himself enough to leave his hands off it, lest he squashed this fragile thing.

But none of these possibilities turned out to be the case. Instead, Wolfgang had entered the locker room and looked at him with a face that seemed to speak of uncertainty and sadness, if Salieri didn't know better than that. Hoping that not everything was lost, Salieri had smiled at him.

Immediately, Wolfgang's face had cleared from any negative emotion and instead given way to relief. Maybe he had taken his smile as an apology for his bad behaviour, and as a promise to never do this kind of shit again.

And like this, their friendship continued.

Wolfgang still used the locker beside his, still sat next to him for warm-ups, and still invited him out for food or for private training sessions. Yet, Salieri couldn't help but notice that something had changed. That afternoon had seemed to put a strain on their relationship, the silences between empty conversations no longer pleasant, their casual touches few and far in between, and if they _did_ touch either or both of them startled away.

It reminded him of the time after his parents had died. Looking at old photo albums had given him comfort, but it didn't come close to the real thing and did nothing to ease the deep ache that had nested inside his heart. Yet, he couldn't discard of them.

It wasn't the only thing he noticed.

He thought he was imagining it at first, but after a few days he couldn't deny it anymore.   
Rosenberg had begun to treat Wolfgang differently. He hadn't been friendly or even civil before, as was the case with any dancer in the company, but now he was downright hostile.

Not a lesson went by that he didn't fling insulting, maybe even abusive from an instructor-trainee point of view, words at the blond, and he kept pushing the man far beyond his limits. And Wolfgang, being the perfectionist and people-pleaser he was, didn't fight back.

The idiot probably thought that his performance really _was_ subpar, and that Rosenberg's actions were justified.   
Salieri knew they weren't.

Wolfgang had saved him from himself before. Now it was his turn to keep Wolfgang from destroying himself.

 

 

**~*~**

 

 

Everything hurt, and this had only been their morning class.

He wasn't dumb – he had noticed Rosenberg pushing him harder lately, but maybe this really was just his wake-up call to get his shit together before their dress rehearsal. Still, he has been so tired since that evening with Antonio, and no matter how hard he tried he just couldn't do anything right.   
Nannerl seemed to always be concerned lately.

Still, this was not the time to dwell on all of that; something wasn't right.

He could see that Antonio was dragging behind, most likely to talk to Rosenberg. Had that geezer asked him to talk again? This .. wasn't good. If he wanted to talk, then it was probably to criticise. Antonio had trained so hard, pushed himself so badly to get to where he was, and being pushed down again would shatter him. Wolfgang wouldn't be able to silence his superior, but he could at least pick up the pieces of Antonio's heart.

So he made sure to be the last to leave the room and, instead of closing the door, he left a gap and leant against the wall next to it, so that he could eavesdrop on their conversation from outside.

He only had to wait a few moments before he heard a surprised humming sound from Rosenberg.  
"Salieri, what do you want?"  
...huh. So it hadn't been Rosenberg who wanted to talk, but Antonio. But why?   
He – he didn't want to ask to be transferred to another company because of Wolfgang, did he?

"I know what you're doing."  
"I'm doing a lot of things, you'll have to be more specific than that."  
"You're pushing Mozart."  
Oh. Hearing Antonio use his surname hurt. Eyebrows pinched together, he squeezed his hand into the shirt over his heart.

"I'm the ballet master, I'm pushing all of my students."  
"You know what I mean."  
For a while, there was only silence, broken by an exasperated sigh from Rosenberg at one point.

"I can't stand him. He's so .. _privileged_ , having been born to two dancers, basically having had talent pushed into his cradle. He probably never worked for any skill in his life, and I can't _stand_ how good he is despite that. I don't like his personality either. I hate him."  
Wolfgang wanted to get away. But – he couldn't. Something kept him glued to the floor right where he stood.

Rosenberg continued. " _You_ , on the other hand, my dear Salieri. You know you're my favourite student, and you've worked hard, overcome all hardships. I want you to stay the face of the company, the first principal dancer, and get all the leading roles you deserve. Especially now that you've seemed to have finally overcome your injury. Sadly, I'm not the single decision-maker in this company, there is still Cavalieri breathing down my neck and the boss holding his hands over our head. I can't get rid of him without both of their approval." At this point, Antonio obviously meant to speak up, but Rosenberg interrupted him. "I know you can still dance Siegfried, or at least get it down until the dress rehearsal. And even if not, we still have understudies. I don't care which, I just want that Mozart brat away from your post."

Antonio sounded cold. "How do you plan to do that? And what about his sister?"

Wolfgang felt like crying.  
"She can stay, for all I care – god knows she is still privileged, but at least she doesn't test my nerves so much. And by all means, it would do Aloysia Weber good to have her arrogance knocked down a notch. And we need a reason to throw him out – a big injury or a scandal would be the only means that would work, probably. But I'll need your help, Salieri. Help me frame him, or push him to injury."  
Another long silence followed, making Wolfgang finally shed the tears that have been blurring his vision. He hoped nobody would see him like this.

"You're insane," Antonio finally answered, his voice sharp as a knife, and the only thing that kept Wolfgang from sobbing out loud was the hand that he hastily pressed to his mouth. "I don't care if he gets leading roles, even if he becomes a face of the company, god knows he deserves it. There's more than one ballet in the world, you can still give both of us roles. I won't help you in your – in this crazy scheme of you. Besides, how could you ask me, someone who has suffered a nearly career-breaking injury just recently, to put somebody else through such a horror?"

"Salieri, you know I think highly of you, and haven't I given you the world since you started training under me? By now you should have learned that you should listen to me. You never seem to know what's good for you and what isn't."  
"Never before in my life have I been so sure of something. This is … _he_ is good for me; and I will not see to him being hurt by you. Wolfgang has become dear to me, and if you still end up harming him, I'll tell the boss about our conversation. Hell, I'll do anything to throw you under the bus."

A bittersweet feeling had erupted inside Wolfgang's heart, his shoulder shook from the silent sobs that he could barely hold back.

"God Salieri, you sound like a love-sick puppy." Rosenberg's voice sounded almost nervous. "But fine, have it your way. But know that I will remember this conversation, and if I see only one misstep from him, _I_ will see to _him_ being kicked. Now get out of my sight. Don't forget your training session in the afternoon."  
It occurred too late to Wolfgang that he should bolt, lest any or both of them see him like that, but before he could even move an inch Antonio's steps had already quickly approached the door, which he promptly swung open. It only took him a second to discover Wolfgang slumped against the wall, his eyes widening in surprise.

Before the other danseur could say anything and alert Rosenberg, who was still inside the room, of Wolfgang's presence, Wolfgang finally found it in himself to move and grabbed for Antonio's arm.

It felt like a god-sent that he didn't resist to being pulled into an empty room somewhere down the corridor. The door fell shut behind them with a deafening click.

"Wolfgang, I'm-"

Giving him no chance to talk, he threw himself at Antonio so that he could press his face into the other man's shoulder and hug him tightly, the sobs he had been holding back finally being violently released.

"A-antonio … th-thank you so, so much." A sob broke him off. "I thought you hated me after I just overstepped our – our boun-boundaries." His chest felt incredibly tight, just getting this simple, stuttered sentence out took him all his strength.

Antonio laid his hands on both of his cheeks, gently lifting Wolfgang's face which was probably ugly from crying upwards and wiping his tears away with his thumbs.

"Tell me honestly, Wolfgang, did you want it?"  
"Yes, but – but _you_ -"  
And suddenly, Antonio was kissing him.

For a second, Wolfgang was stunned, but his lips responded as if they had a mind of their own.

Antonio was really kissing him.

But heck, it was awkward; Wolfgang could hardly breathe through the snot that still clogged up his nose, and between his hug and Antonio's hands still holding his cheeks, they were uncomfortably squished against each other.  
Laughing, Wolfgang broke off.

"Wait, let me blow my nose and then we can try again. This is awkward."

The tears that were now clouding his eyes were ones of unadulterated joy, and once he wiped them away with a tissue he could see Antonio's face, which was nothing short of loving.

It even stayed that way through Wolfgang's unattractive nose-blowing.

Antonio's hands had now wandered towards Wolfgang's hips, and unsure where he should put his own, he laid them on the mans underarms.

"I'm sorry, I ruined the moment," he giggled, slightly embarrassed, but shut up as soon as he could feel one of the man's hands move towards his cheek again to pull him back in.

This time he allowed himself to enjoy it.

Antonio's lips were incredibly soft – and wasn't that a comical thought, this often stoic man putting on lip products – and his thumbs softly caressed Wolfgang's skin from where they lay. It was a simple kiss, an innocent one, yet Wolfgang had never felt this content.

When a short while had gone by, they broke apart.

"Thank you," Wolfgang whispered, his face still so close to that of Antonio's that the many probably rather felt than heard the words.  
"For what?"  
"For … just for not being mad at me. And for defending me from Rosenberg. I didn't think he was treating me that way because of actual ill intent."  
"There was nothing to be mad about, and I knew that you wouldn't recognise it as such. Actually, thank _you_. For being my friend, for helping me overcome myself, for everything. I ..." Here he broke himself off before he could say any more, and before Wolfgang could press him for what he was about to say, Antonio pushed a series of small pecks on his face.

"You should go now, I know that you've got a practice session in just a bit, and we wouldn't want you to be late," Antonio advised.  
"...Okay. Will I see you later?"  
"I've got costuming and physical therapy appointments today after training, and I wouldn't want you to wait up for me so long. But we can go out for dinner again tomorrow?"  
He couldn't keep himself from pouting.  
"Fine, but I'll take that as a promise now." A last peck on the lips. "See you, then!"  
And then he was back to his schedule. With what had just happened, it wasn't difficult to forget about what he had heard Rosenberg say, so he couldn't accidentally make the session weird.

Yet his good mood still alerted Nannerl about what might have happened, and as soon as they came home she sat him down and got him to talk. Hell, she didn't even have to ask him.

Later that night, with Nannerl already in bed but him still up and about from the happiness that he felt because of the happenstances of that day, he again sat alone on their windowsill.   
The skies were clear. On a whim, he took a selfie of himself illuminated by the city lights and sent it to Antonio.

 

_[11:39 P.M.] Wishing you were here._

_[11:39 P.M.] Sleep well ~_

_[11:46 P.M.] Love you <3 [unsent]_

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> ... :)
> 
> Comments as always well-appreciated, and come scream at me on Tumblr or Twitter!


	11. Fouetté

Why was he nervous?  
It was not like he and Antonio had parted on bad or uncertain terms, quite the opposite.

If anything, he should be excited! Damn elated! But no, he was physically curling up from apprehension; a mockery of the stretch he should be doing.

It was the next morning, the day after they had _kissed_ , after he had listened in on those awful things Rosenberg had said, after they had finally broken the awkwardness that had haunted them over the past few days.

Maybe he was scared that it had only been a dream and that, as soon as Antonio would enter the room, Wolfgang would be confronted with everything still being the same as before.

It reminded him of that dumb plastic ring he had given Antonio, which he still hadn't told anyone about. He hadn't seen Antonio wear it since then.

Just then, before he could stress himself out any more, the door opened and gave sight to Antonio, dressed in his usual workout gear and (to Wolfgang's approval) with his knee bandage on.

He paid none of the other dancers in the room any mind, instead going straight to Wolfgang in big steps and letting himself fall down beside him.   
"Hey there," he greeted, smiling softly, and briefly touched his pointer and middle finger to his lips, only to then move them to Wolfgang's wrist.

All the anxiety in him was extinguished through one single, deep exhale. Outsiders wouldn't have noticed it, but to him it was clear as day. It was a kiss.

He knew Antonio was very private, and with their relationship still being so new, he probably wasn't comfortable with kissing him when so many other people were around. Wolfgang gave the brightest smile in retaliation. Antonio went into his first stretch, and for a while they just went about their warming-up in silence. Until-  
"Hey, Antonio?"  
"Hm?"  
"Do you still have that ring I gave you?"  
Stunned, he stared at Wolfgang. "Of course I do. I haven't taken it off since you gave it to me."  
And then that idiot pulled out a silver chain from underneath his shirt, from which said ring was dangling.

Mouth gaping open wide, Wolfgang returned the stare for a few moments, before suddenly hitting the other dancer's arm.   
"You idiot, how was I supposed to know if you always change in the stalls! I had been worrying that you found it dumb!"

Still holding the ring up, a dumbfounded expression on his face, Antonio flinched away from the punch that barely held any power.

"... I'm sorry?" He finally replied and let go of the ring, not putting it back underneath his shirt.

For some reason, the situation seemed so comical to Wolfgang that he couldn't help but laugh out loud, erupting into wild giggles. Antonio wasn't joining in, but he could see him smile out of the corner of his eye, so at least he wasn't embarrassed for him.

Once his laughter died down, it struck him.   
"Antonio," he gasped. "Should I change my Facebook status??"

"Are you fucking _serious_?"

 

 

It turned out to be a good day. They went about their daily duties, had lunch and dinner together, and by the end of the work day they knew what date the dress rehearsal would take place.

And exactly that was what they were preparing for right now, exactly one week later.

The rehearsal wouldn't start until the late afternoon, but Cavalieri had asked all principal dancers partaking in the ballet to turn up just before lunch. Exactly why, neither he nor Nannerl knew, but the other dancers didn't seem to be concerned with it.

"She usually books a photographer before dress rehearsals so that we can finally put out advertisements," Antonio finally explained, all while looking curiously at the garment that Wolfgang was slowly pulling out of the bag the costuming department had given him. "They've already been advertising the ballet for a few months, of course, but now they finally lift the mystery and reveal the performers. The press call performance will be held soon, too, so that their articles can keep the excitement up. That colour will fit you well."

For this production, the costumers had stayed true to the medieval image most companies went for. The petal white jacket in his arms was interwoven with golden threads, making it shine beautifully, with sleeves that were puffy around the shoulders and elbows. Golden embroidery and delicate aiguillettes adorned it.

"Thank you, Antonio. Can I see yours?"

"It's not as flashy as yours though."

His was the polar opposite of Wolfgang's piece, being of a royal blue so dark it seemed black and held simpler than Wolfgang's without losing its elegance. Where Wolfgang had golden decorations, Antonio's were silver. He didn't have as many as the blond had by far, but the same kind of strings were sewn on to adorn his collar and the space around the pretty buttons adorning his front.

Yes, it might not have been as flashy as Wolfgang's, but he was sure that this would fit Antonio's looks perfectly, and he could already feel his cheeks heating up at the mental image of mister tall, dark, and handsome looking so regal.

While they were still admiring each other's outfits, Hannes – the last one of the male principal dancers partaking in Swan Lake that were supposed to come in early today – finally entered the room, his hands laden full with two clothing bags and a feather-laden headpiece. Seeing him struggle, Wolfgang took the headpiece and the smaller of the bags off him and helped him carry it to where he and Antonio had spread out on one of the benches.

"Thank you. Good morning Wolfgang, Antonio." With a relieved groan, he let his things fall next to where Wolfgang had already dumped the rest. "God, this weighs a ton. I'm glad I can take my cape off for dancing, I can't even imagine how Aloysia is supposed to fare in her Queen Mother dress."  
"Can I have a look?" Wolfgang asked, already reaching for the bigger bag's zipper. All of today was so exciting; of course he had danced in costume before, but he had never been the face of a production, and much less had _pictures_ taken of him.

"Sure," Hannes answered and took out his top from the smaller bag while Wolfgang was already admiring the heavy, dark burgundy cape. It had a feathery pattern on the inside, probably so that Hannes could lift the sides up to give the illusion of wings, and could be fastened at the front by a series of chains. The fabric felt really heavy, which was unusual for ballet costumes, but he guessed that Hannes would really only wear it for when he wasn't doing difficult dancing.

Satisfied with looking at that, Wolfgang now had a look at the top jacket Hannes was already slipping on. It too looked royal, and was of a colour just slightly brighter than that of his cape.  
"Wolfgang," Antonio called out from behind him. "You probably should get ready, we don't have that much time left."

Like so, just the three of them got dressed, all of them wearing white tights and flats next to their tops, all while chatting a bit. After, they went to the room number Cavalieri had told them, not without receiving a few appreciating looks from other dancers mingling around the building.

Nannerl, Constanze and Aloysia where already inside, sitting in front of vanity mirrors and waiting for their hair and make-up to be done. The girls' costumes nearly mirrored theirs; Nannerl's white swan bodice having some golden insets, while Constanze's black one had some silver details. Aloysia on the other hand wore a vibrant, heavy aristocratic dress.

"Wolfi!" Nannerl called out to him as soon as she saw him enter through the mirror. "You look so charming!"   
They had seen each other in their costumes before, of course, but Wolfgang still felt relieved by her renewed approval. He enthusiastically threw his compliments back at all three of them, before being distracted by Cavalieri entering the room and pushing him and the other two men into their own chairs so that they could get their own make-up done.   
Not soon after that, the photographer appeared and guided all of them through a photo session. Wolfgang mostly took solo pictures and ones with either Nannerl or Constanze, but right at the end, the photographer asked Antonio to join him.

Wolfgang felt slightly uncomfortable with the whole process, fully aware that he didn't know what he was doing, and he could see that Nannerl was feeling the same way; all the other dancers, on the other hand, seemed to be used to it and took the photographer's requests in stride.

As exciting as it had been, he was glad when it was over.

"Okay, ladies and gentlemen," Cavalieri called out over the sound of timid clapping that had started in the room after the last photo had been taken. "Before you make your way to the theatre for the dress rehearsal, I'd like to ask all of you to promote the production as much as you can. I know that we asked you to keep quiet up till now, but the posters should come up as soon as all editing and printing has been done so we don't mind you advertising it already. Of course, you don't have to, but you might be able to bring in some younger people who otherwise wouldn't come. Now go and rest for a bit before the rehearsal begins, we will see each other then."

 

 

All of them were sitting in the first row of the otherwise empty theatre auditorium, watching as the orchestra got ready in the pit and the tech personnel prepared the stage. They knew that backstage must be hell, what with all the corps and soloists getting themselves ready for the rehearsal. Since they were were already in full gear they didn't have to navigate their way around the busyness and instead got to relax and chat a bit before the communal warm-up would begin. Sandwiched between his sister and his _boyfriend_ , Wolfgang couldn't decide who he should rather lean against.

Instead, he consoled his own nervousness by wildly making both of his legs bounce, until eventually Antonio was fed up with him (having known him for all of her life, Nannerl was already used to tuning out his antics and was instead concentrating on talking to Constanze and Hannes next to her) and put an arm around him while holding Wolfgang's right leg down with his other hand.

"If you keep doing that, I'll gladly take Rosenberg up on that plan to fucking break your legs," he whispered, promptly making Wolfgang sit as still as a stone.

Antonio snorted.

He opened his mouth, obviously just about to say something, when Rosenberg's microphone-amplified voice interrupted him.

"All principal dancers and soloists to the stage, and all corps to the backstage hall please, we're doing warm-ups."

Usually, companies did a one to two hour warm-up before the dancers put their costumes on and entered the stage, but today was an exception, what with them all already being dressed up and the warm-up only lasting for a bit over half an hour.

It felt a bit weird to do their routine following Rosenberg's instructions on a big stage, looking out over the empty house while clutching on to portable barres that should have no place on a stage.

It wouldn't be his first dress rehearsal, but it was his first dress rehearsal as a principal dancer in a main role; yet, he felt next to no nervousness. For some reason, he felt it deep in his bones – everything would go well.

 

 

And so it did. All the performances came together like a glorious patchwork quilt, and while he could spy some of the corps and soloists miss some cues or make some mistakes (for which Rosenberg would surely roast them later, those poor souls), none of them, the principal dancers, mis-stepped even once. Once the last note rang out, everyone erupted into loud cheers and clapping.

Happy that everything had turned out so well, Wolfgang threw himself at Nannerl and Constanze, who were closest to him.  
"Bravo, brava!" Rosenberg's unimpressed voice called out over the tumult. "The principal dancers can go get changed, I'll talk to you the next time you have a session with me. As for the rest of the dancers, please come to the backstage hall ..."  
That was when Wolfgang tuned him out and turned away from the two women, rushing ahead of them so that he could look for Antonio.

The man seemed to be waiting for him by the sidelines of the stage, and as soon as he was in reach, he grabbed for Wolfgang's hand and led him towards a secluded area, where he pulled him into a strong hug.

"You were amazing, Wolfgang," he mumbled and pressed a short kiss to his forehead. "Now who of us is the primo ballerino."

"Oh, I'm pretty sure Hannes will take hold of that title for today," Wolfgang answered and stole a kiss. "I didn't know he was such a good actor, he was mesmerising and terrifying at once."

"You should've heard what he said backstage during that first -"  
"Wolfie!" Nannerl's voice rang out from somewhere behind them and, startled, they jumped apart.

Just a second later she walked around the corner that hid them from view, smiling upon sight.

"There you are! Come on, let's get changed and go home. Antonio, would you like to join us for dinner?"  
"Su-sure. Thanks."

Still smiling brightly, she nodded and turned around to presumably make her way towards the women's changing rooms; they did the same after a moment of silence, and just a little while later the three of them were reunited in front of the company building and set off for their home.

"Did the dress rehearsals you've participated in here in Vienna always go this well?" His sister asked Antonio curiously.

"Hmm, no. Some do, but most usually have some mishaps, sometimes even injuries."

"What's the funniest thing that has ever happened?"  
He obviously had to wreck his brain for something, and took him a few moments to find a reply.

"One ballerina accidentally arabesqued the wig off a corps dancer once. That was back when I wasn't as high-ranked yet, after that I couldn't pay as much attention to others anymore, but if you want funny stories I'm sure Hannes and Stephanie have some a-plenty. I've seen them watch performances they aren't even in, probably because they're friends with a lot of dancers."

"I'll keep that in mind. What did the corps dancer do?"  
Like this, they chatted for a while, eventually beginning to discuss what they should order for dinner (since no one was in the mood for cooking) and made plans to also watch a movie. Since they would have the following day off, they didn't mind staying up late for that.

Eventually, after the conversation had dimmed down for a while, Nannerl looked at them with drawn-together eyebrows.  
"You don't have to hold back just because I'm here, you know," she said. "If you want to hold hands or something like that, you can."

Simultaneously, Antonio and he halted in their steps.   
"How?"   
The furrow between her eyebrows grew deeper, if that was even possible.  
"Honey, I'm Wolfie's big sister, do you really think he wouldn't tell me about this?“ She now smiled through her frown, all while Antonio himself looked extremely uncomfortable. Struggling to lift the mood, Wolfgang thought of what to do. Hesitating for only a good second or two, he grabbed for Antonio's hand.

And then, more resolute, for Nannerl's.

 

 

They ended up ordering pizza and eating it on their sofa, while discussing which movie they should watch.   
"For the last damn time, Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart, I am _not_ watching any animated movie with you on a movie night, we're _adults_ -"  
"Well, I am not watching your stupid dramas!"

" _Well_ , Antonio doesn't want to watch our usual RomComs and I am _sure_ ," she scrolled through the Netflix listing aggressively, "that he doesn't want to watch your stupid cartoons either -"  
"Hey, what about that. Black Swan. Fitting, no? Haven't seen it in a while," said danseur interrupted them, obviously amused of their antics and badly hiding his grin behind his hand.

"Hm, me neither," Nannerl replied and opened the overview.

The words _Psychological Thriller_ underneath the plot summary made Wolfgang squirm where he sat between the other two, and he was just about to complain when a genius thought occurred to him: If he was scared, he could simply hide in Antonio's safe, strong arms.  
"Yea, let's watch that!" he agreed quicker and more cheerful than either of them must have anticipated by the weird looks they were giving him, but Nannerl didn't comment on it any more and simply pressed play.  
The beginning of the movie wasn't too bad, so that he could finish his dinner in peace, and after that it was a mixture of awkwardness about the explicit scenes (he was watching this movie with his _sister_ and his _new boyfriend_ ) and squeamishness in more gruesome scenes.   
Antonio had permanently moved his arm around Wolfgang, and Nannerl's propped up legs rested partly on his, so he felt quite physically comforted, yet when the main character pulled off _a goddamn big chunk of skin from her fucking finger, what the fuck_ he couldn't help but press his face into Antonio's chest. He could feel him chuckle slightly at his antics, but he simply didn't care, for he suddenly noticed just how tired he was, encompassed as he was by darkness, warmth, and the soothing smell of Antonio.  
Before he knew it, he had fallen asleep.

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Feedback always much appreciated.
> 
> Come chat with me on Tumblr or Twitter!


	12. Piqué

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Please note the change in rating. If you wish to skip the explicit scene, please scroll to the end of the chapter's author's notes, where I will list which paragraphs to skip. 
> 
> **Terms for this chapter:**  
>  Pas de deux - a duet in dancing
> 
> Enjoy reading! ;)

When Salieri woke up, he strangely felt the most comforted and most uncomfortable he ever had, both at once. His neck was pretty stiff, and something kept him from moving and doing something about it. Grumpy, he looked down to locate the culprit.  
Golden hair.

His angelic boyfriend was still fast asleep against his chest, a soft blanket covering them both from his shoulders down. Casting a quick look around, Salieri could see that they were still in the siblings' living room; soft morning light was already seeping through the big windows and, dimly, he could hear a shower running in the background. His eyes flitted back.  
He could remember Wolfgang falling asleep on him, and him and Nannerl watching the movie a bit more, occasionally commenting on how unrealistic some things were, but then there was no more recollection of what happened after. He must've fallen asleep too, and during the night the both of them must've moved far enough that they weren't sitting up anymore, but rather lying down with the blond squashing him from above.

Sighing, he accepted his fate and closed his arms around Wolfgang.

 

Time went by, at one point he could hear the bathroom door open, the soft tapping sound of feet, and another door closing again; until, eventually, the man in his arms began to stir.  
"Nghhhh," he grumbled, not the least bit charming. His hand reached out to have a feel of his surroundings, hitting Salieri's face in the meantime.

"A wonderful good morning to you too," Salieri greeted him in his most deadpan voice and, as an afterthought - "... Dear."  
Wolfgang's giggling was as pure as ever, if sleepy. "Why does it sound so fake when you say it," he joke-whined and propped himself up with his arms so that his face was dangling above Salieri's. "My darling honey, sweetheart, moon to my sun, sugar, pumpkin, _babe_ ," he whispered through soft laughing all while Eskimo-kissing Salieri, until finally pressing a short kiss to his lips. "Good morning."  
"What's _wrong with you_. And don't you ever dare call me 'babe' again." He practically spat the word out like it was a spoilt fruit.

"Oh, but pumpkin is okay? Wait, I've got more – pretty, buttercup, honey bunny, baby doll-"   
He was shut up by a kiss. Or five.  
Wolfgang had let himself sink down onto Salieri's body again and they were still deeply occupied with kissing by the time Nannerl interrupted them.

"Keep it PG, please," she announced her presence as she sat down on the sofa's armrest to their feet. "Did you sleep well? I hope the sofa didn't hurt your backs too much, but neither of you seems to mind anyway so-"  
" _Nannerl!"_ Wolfgang whined for real now, looking back at her; Salieri couldn't see his expression, but his assumption of it being one of embarrassment or affront probably wasn't too far off.

"What? If you expose me to PDA, I can comment on it." She ate a spoonful of yoghurt from the bowl in her hand, reaching for the remote while the spoon was still in her mouth and putting the TV on. They hadn't even heard her go into the kitchen to get some breakfast.  
"This is not the public, we're at _home_ ," her brother grumbled and, seemingly having given up, turned back around to press his face into the juncture between Salieri's neck and shoulder.

Sympathetically, he patted Wolfgang's back.

They remained like that for quite some time, with Wolfgang still having his face pressed into Salieri’s shoulder and being so quiet that he half suspected the man to have dozen off again (in no world could the blond be so quiet while conscious) if it weren't for the fact that he could feel small fingers tap out whimsical rhythms on his biceps. Salieri wasn't even completely sure what Maria had put on. He looked at the TV and heard what the people in the program were saying but recalled none of it just a second later.

Minutes flew by just so, Salieri's sense of time lost to the soft lull of having Wolfgang in his arms and quiet sounds and gentle morning light surrounding them, and gradually his lids became heavier until he fell into a doze, even though he had just woken up.

 

 

He came to consciousness again, not eased into it but ripped from its counterpart forcefully by something painfully poking his rips multiple times, in quick succession.  
"Jesus Fuck -" he startled and grabbed towards what was nagging him. It was Wolfgang's hand. The man wasn't even looking at his victim, instead his eyes were glued to the smartphone in his other hand.

Before he could complain any more, Wolfgang thrust it in front of his face with an annoyed 'Look!', not bearing in mind that Salieri couldn't really recognise what was on the screen if it was basically touching his nose.   
Sighing, he pushed it further away so that the contents were more than a blurred mess.

What he was met with was … themselves.

It was a picture of them sitting on the same couch they were now lying on, both fast asleep with Wolfgang's head resting on Salieri's shoulder and his own on top of Wolfgang's head. They were hugging each other, even in sleep, and were lit up with soft lamp-light from behind and a colder blue one hitting their front.

A glance towards the top of the screen confirmed his suspicion – Nannerl had taken a picture of them after they fell asleep watching the movie, and posted it before going to bed.

Underneath the picture was the beginning of what Nannerl wrote about it, and Salieri scrolled down Wolfgang's Instagram so that he could read everything.  
 _Our dear Prince Siegfried and his significant other Benno fallen asleep after movie night. I wonder if they're sharing some sweet dreams? Wishing the same to all my dear followers, rest well lovelies! XX –_ followed by a row of personal and random hashtags, and some that pointed to their company and production. Her comment reminded him of the way Wolfgang wrote, just more elevated.

Out of curiosity, he scrolled down towards the comment section. Of course all of Nannerl's followers knew her brother, but a majority of the comments boiled down to people wondering who he was (until enlightened by some strangers who must know the company's principals or must've haunted their webpage), a _lot_ of people commenting on how 'cute' they were together and some natural joking. All in all, the response was more positive than he would've maybe thought, Nannerl's account must have had a natural aura of caring that kept all trolls and haters away.

He turned the screen back towards Wolfgang, not even caring to get out his own phone to check if anybody had found his own account. Nothing on it suggested that it belonged to Antonio Salieri; his nickname was wholly generic and anonymous, and his contents were barren safe for some whimsy pictures of things that he had seen in the streets and found interesting.

"And?" Wolfgang prompted.  
"And what?"  
"Have you seen the amount of likes! That's five times of what Nannerl and I usually get, and the _comments_! I'm so mad at her!" He slapped the phone down onto Salieri's pecs, and crossed his arms above in indignation. Salieri's hands moved towards his boyfriend's sides so that he could hold him in a gesture of comfort.  
"You aren't mad that she made that post?" He asked for clarification because, to him, Wolfgang's emotions were confusing at the best of times.  
"No, of course not! I'm mad that she took and posted a couple pic of us before we managed to. And _then made it go viral_." His voice was a bit muffled from where his face was pressed against Salieri's sternum. Suddenly, his head went up again, and he looked at him with determined eyes. "We're going to _top her._ Come on, I'll get dressed really quick and then we can go to your place so that you can change. And then we'll go out so that we can take the best damn couple pics anyone has ever seen and best her puny little post!" - Followed by Wolfgang scrambling to get up, nearly kneeing him in the balls in the process, and leaving him alone to get changed.   
Not even ten minutes later they were on their way to his own flat, which Wolfgang had not yet been to, and mildly ashamed, Salieri let him in.

"It's … not as homely as Nannerl's and your place," he warned before letting the blond into the small corridor. "Living room and kitchen are to your right if you'd like to sit down or have refreshments. I'll … be right back."

He made sure that Wolfgang was settled before he went to his bedroom, which was only slightly less barren than the rest of his flat, to put on some new clothes. He kept his boyfriend's outfit and the fact that he'd physically appear on social media (that wasn't official at least) for the first time today in mind while choosing what to wear, and when he came out again he was met with Wolfgang looking inside his fridge.

"We should get some breakfast first before we go out, I'm starving!" came the complaint as soon as Salieri made himself known. "Also, why do you have no photos around?"

"We can get something on the way. And I've only got one photo worthwhile hanging up, which is in my room. Now come on, let's go. There's a nice café around the corner."

 

 

He ordered breakfast for them, with a coffee for himself and some juice for Wolfgang because Nannerl has warned him about giving her brother caffeine, and they took their time eating it until, with their food halfway gone, Wolfgang pulled out his phone to take a picture of their table.

He showed it to Salieri after; only his hands and sleeves were visible, with their table and its contents taking up most of the frame.

"We'll build up to the real stuff, let's tease a bit for now," Wolfgang explained, already typing away on his probably trazillion social media accounts, and Salieri took care to make a mental note to look them up later that night and secretly download all the pictures. God knows that's the only reason he's actually enduring his boyfriend's plan.  
"Where do we start?" he asked and impulsively reached out to intertwine his right hand with Wolfgang's left.

"Good question." A smile and a squeeze back. "How about we pay our dear friends homage and take some pictures on the Prater?"  
  


 

They did exactly that, taking a picture in front of the Ferris wheel mirroring the one Lorenzo and Stephanie had posted exactly, amongst ones using other fair attractions. After, they spent a few more hours going around different locations, taking a selfie here and there and asking strangers to photograph them otherwise.

"We should have invited somebody to be our designated photographer," Wolfgang moaned as he looked through his gallery critically, as if he was a professional, but he's smiling and has got a pretty glint in his eyes, and that alone made the day worth it.

They ended up taking the bus to a park, Wolfgang on his phone to check the responses to what little he had already posted ("What's the use in bombing everything out immediately? My content goes through an intensive process of elimination and editing before -" before Salieri shut him up.) and Salieri contenting himself with looking at his prince's profile and giving the occasional 'hm' in reaction to Wolfgang's chittering. Him playing close attention was the only reason he noticed how Wolfgang's smile widened minisculey and, wondering what caused it, he looked down at the blond's phone.

He could recognise that it was one of those Instagram story-timelines, and judging by the looks of it, somebody had cut down a long video into many little pieces to fit everything in despite the length-restriction. The phone must've been propped upwards on the floor, filming one of the practice rooms of their company from ceiling to floor, if at a slight angle, and showing Nannerl and Constanze. They were doing slight arm stretches, both in pointe shoes, with Nannerl dressed in practice gear that was more on the loose side while Constanze had gone the full way and dressed in tights and a bodice, with a black tutu on top. Then, Constanze glided into a starting position while Wolfgang's sister moved out of the frame, presumably to put on music that they couldn't hear because the phone was muted.

But Salieri didn't need music to recognise the choreography.

It was the _pas de deux_ between Odile and Prince Siegfried, and he almost thought that Constanze would practise her role alone, before Nannerl jumped in again and improvised the role her brother usually embodied. Undeniably, she had made the role her own, but some elements of the original choreography were still visible.  
"Look at how well she has remembered my part!" Wolfgang gushed. "She watched me practise so often, but I love how she's adding in pointe work and her own moves!"  
Salieri gave a short hum of confirmation and they kept watching until, at the end, the two women ended the _pas_ and Nannerl fell again Constanze, laughing, pushing her out of frame.   
After that, the video cut off and what happened after was left to their imagination.

They talked a bit about what they had just seen for the rest of the ride, their station coming soon in sight so that they could stumble out of the bus.

The park was beautiful this time of year, and accordingly well-visited. There's a constant backdrop of children and adults alike playing around, dogs barking at squirrels and birds singing wherever they go, be it to take a picture a bit aside, just walking around or when stealing away to a less visible corner to fit in some pecks.

They took a picture of themselves kissing beneath a small tree, its colourful branches partially covering them as Wolfgang skilfully takes the picture, it looking good despite him having his eyes closed. A billion other pictures follow, so many that Salieri couldn't even remember half of them, intermitted by some pictures he took of Wolfgang feeding some of the park's ducks.

By the time his boyfriend deemed their day's goal fulfilled, it's already late afternoon. Wolfgang didn't seem to have reached his daily dosage of movement yet, though, since just a second after declaring their success he called out a 'Race me!' and speeded up the little hill at whose foot they had been standing.

"Why would I?" he called back and watched in amusement as Wolfgang stopped in his running to look back at him with the most childish look of indignation on his face.   
"Spoilsport! Who wins gets a wish of course! Goal is the tree back there!" And then he's off again, this time with Salieri on his heels because the idea of having a free wish actually sounded good. To his fortune, Wolfgang had chosen style over practicality today, while for Salieri it had been the complete opposite, and so he caught up to him quickly. They were on a meadow that held quite a lot of small flowers, halfway to the end of their race, but for some reason Salieri reached for Wolfgang and held him back, letting himself fall to floor and pulling the other man with him once they didn't have momentum anymore as to not hurt them, instead of passing him and getting to the tree first.  
"You cheater!" Wolfgang spluttered beside him and, in his playful ire, ripped out a handful of grass to let it rain down on Salieri. "You absolute dingus!"  
"I still get my wish." He rolled them over so that he could shake out the grass on his head onto Wolfgang.   
"No way, you fraud!" the blond yelped, holding his arms up to shield himself from the grass-shower. "I don't care if you're faster than me, once you cheat you're disqualified! And since _I'm_ the last winner in the race -"  
"Oh come on-"  
Before they could erupt into a proper discussion, they both somehow simultaneously began play-wrestling with each other, rolling around on the ground, occasionally throwing grass at each other and sometimes pressing out soft grunts and giggles from where they accidentally hit each other.

By the end of it, they're both breathing heavily, and as if moving as one they're suddenly sharing a deep kiss. Salieri didn't even care that they're in such an open, visible space, he simply enjoyed feeling Wolfgang against him and cradling his face above him.

It didn't go on for much longer, both of them having already been a bit out of breath when it started, and it ended naturally with Wolfgang letting himself sink to his back on the ground, his head pillowed on Salieri's stomach where he could pet the soft hair with one hand.

Having been on their legs all day long, the relaxation felt good. They spent a good chunk of time _cloud-spotting_ for god's sake, and he _liked_ it. Until, eventually, Wolfgang rolled over so that his face was facing Salieris', moved the rest of his body into fetal-position and then simply … dozed off.

Salieri himself didn't feel like sleeping, especially since he wasn't sure what kind of weirdoes or burglars would come up to them in a park and he didn't want to leave them unguarded, but he also didn't feel like waking his prince. For just a while he just stared up into the sky, before his gaze wandered to the flowers around them and he gingerly picked some of them to place them on Wolfgang – in his hair, his hands, any crevice that could hold a stem – trying not to jostle him too much so that he wouldn't wake him. When that was done, he was back at base boredom again and, not knowing what else to do except for falling asleep himself or just staring into the air, he got out his cellphone. After staring at his home menu for a bit, not knowing what exactly to do, he impulsively clicked on the camera symbol before holding the phone high over them.

He moved his other hand to Wolfgang's waist, and then he took a picture, and two more for good measure, before looking at them.

They looked a mess. They both had stains on their clothes and grass in their hair, with Salieri's usual meticulous ponytail in wide disarray and Wolfgang still decorated by flowers, yet they still looked good. Wolfgang looked like an angel in his sleep, as usual, and Salieri was … smiling. He hadn't even noticed that. Looking closer at himself, he actually looked … love-struck. His eyes were soft, happy crows feet at their corners, and his smile wasn't the usual tight-lipped one.

He loved the picture.  
So much so that he set it at the wallpaper for his phone, therefore giving up on the previous one he had of Wolfgang sleeping in a train that he had taken off the man's Instagram after the first time they met.

And then, on another whim, he created a new email address and began setting up a new Instagram account, because that seemed to be the one his boyfriend used the most. He chose a proper name this time – going for a simple 'Antonio.Salieri' – and even went to their company website to download the picture they had of him for their principal dancers overview and to set it as his profile picture. Before he could change his mind, he went to post the picture he had just taken, no filters or anything added, just as they were, and tagged Wolfgang's account. For a little while, he pondered what to write into his comment, before making up his mind, adding some of the hashtags he had seen the siblings use, and pressed 'post'.

 

~*~

 

It was the evening of that same day, and Wolfgang couldn't be any more sated. He had taken lots of great pictures with his boyfriend, had a great nap on those heavenly abs, and woken up to Antonio having created an Instagram account and added him on a picture that was signed with ' _My prince. X'_ , which he had promptly set as his background image.

They had just gone out for dinner, and were now stepping back into Wolfgang's and Nannerl's flat. Antonio had argued that he should go home at first, but Wolfgang had masterfully convinced him to share just one more snogging-session with him. Which they were right in the midst of.

A soft sigh broke out of him as Antonio eased his tongue into a kiss for the first time ever, encasing Wolfgang where he lay underneath him on his bed, and he allowed for some exploration to be done before he pushed the dance back into his boyfriend's mouth. In the meantime, he tried to wriggle Antonio's hair out of his hair tie (he loved to let his hand glide through, so what?), almost letting free a frustrated groan when he just couldn't manage to, before a sudden sound interrupted them. They almost ignored it, before Wolfgang recognised the poppy tune Nannerl had jokingly set for his father's ringtone while he left her alone with his phone, so he pulled back and looked up apologetically before grabbing into his jeans to take the call.  
"Yes, father?" he greeted the man and motioned for Antonio to let him sit up so that he could talk better.

"Did you seriously think we wouldn't find out, you foolish boy?" Leopold's booming voice greeted him, loud enough that Antonio could probably hear him too, even without the speaker turned on. "You are to end this at once."  
"What are you talking about?" Wolfgang knew what he was talking about, but maybe downplaying it would soothe his father. Antonio grabbed for his free hand, and when he looked up, he could see the concern in his boyfriend's eyes.

"You know very well what I'm talking about. This _thing_ you've got going on with that _man_ – I forbid you to continue with it. We had this conversation years ago, I really thought you had learned. You disappoint me, son." Leopold's voice was that of a whip, lashing out with guilt-inducing aggression, and under normal circumstances, Wolfgang would have caved. Yet his eyes still lay on Antonio, and on the blue plastic ring that he had pulled out from under his shirt all day long, and they were sitting in his and Nannerl's own flat. He was an adult now, he was living his own life far away from the grasp of his father, and where only a year ago he would've listened to his father's every call and whistle, he now had more important things in his life. He'd rather anger him than lose Antonio. And he wasn't blind after all – or, at least, Nannerl had opened his eyes long ago – his father had caused self-doubt and feelings of inferiority in him since his early childhood, but only recently had he also begun to see that he didn't deserve any of that.

"Well, you disappoint me too, _father,_ " he concluded. "Good bye."  
And then he hung up and just … stared at his phone for a good few moments. The first tendrils of regret for having talked to his parent like that were already looming on him, before Antonio pulled the phone out of his hand, put it to the side, and pulled him into his arms and down onto the bed.

Like that they remained for some time, Antonio comforting him with soft whispers and reassurances, and Wolfgang telling him a bit about the shit his father pulled over the years.

Night had already covered them in darkness when his phone pinged up with a message from his mother. Apprehensive, he grabbed for it.

_'Ignore your father, you know how he is. And I'll still love you no matter what, and I'd love to meet this handsome boyfriend of yours the next time I visit you and your sisters. We also saw the ads for your production. I already told you when you called us about what roles you got, but I'll say it again – I'm so proud of you my little sunshine! Hug your sister for me. Love, Mum'_

He smiled big, relieved, and looked up to Antonio. "My mum would love to meet you."  
  


 

It was about a week later, and Wolfgang was inside Antonio's flat again. It still looked the exact same as it had when he had visited for the first time; there wasn't even any books or articles of clothing lying around except for on the coatrack near the entrance. Just for good measure, he ignored it and let his thin jacket fall on the backrest of the sofa instead before moving into the open kitchen area and putting his bag on the counter.

"So, what are we doing for dinner?" he asked, already opening the cupboards and fridge to have a look inside. They had just come home from work, Wolfgang temporarily thrown out of his flat by Nannerl who was having a girls' night with Constanze.

"I've got some salmon fillets for protein, and we can toss up a salad to compliment it. I usually eat light around dinner-time, I hope you don't mind?"

"Antonio I've spent enough time with you by now to know that you eat like a rabbit. Don't mind me, Nannerl usually runs me through the same diet, I just like to be naughty when I'm out."

"I'll cook you some of my mother's dishes someday."  
Wolfgang turned away from where he was pulling ingredients out of the fridge to smile at Antonio. "I'd love that."  
They began preparing quietly after that, Wolfgang cutting up the ingredients for the salad into a big bowl while Antonio marinated the fish and roasting it before putting it into the oven. Then he mixed up a dressing from oil, vinegar and spices and waiting for the salmon to be done so that they could eat.

"I'm sorry I don't have a proper dining table," Antonio mumbled as they moved to sit down on the couch and put their plates on the small table in front of it. "I don't really have anyone to invite over to eat and buying a table just for myself when I'm only eating one meal tops at home seemed excessive. Or at least I didn't use to have anyone."  
"It's fine!" Wolfgang reassured him and bumped their shoulders together. "This is much more cosy anyway. Are we watching anything?"

 

 

They stayed aseat cuddling for a little while after finishing off their dinner, before Wolfgang began to get jittery.

"Hm?" Antonio asked after about the third time Wolfgang had cleared his throat in search for attention.

"The last time I was here you mentioned that you only had one picture, and I quote, 'worthwhile hanging up'. Do you mind letting me see it?"  
"... Sure, why not. It's not much though," Antonio sighed and heaved the both of them to a stand, leading him into the only room Wolfgang had not yet seen.

His eyes automatically searched the room for the infamous lonesome photograph, which was quickly found hanging on the wall to his left, above a dresser, and he walked towards it.

It was a family picture. Three people were visible from their waist up, a beautiful woman to the left and a stern looking man dressed in a suit to the right, both with dark hair and slightly tanned skin. Between them, undeniably, stood Antonio, barely older than ten and also wearing a suit, just with a bow- instead of a necktie. He was smiling brightly, holding his mother's hand.

Looking at the picture made Wolfgang both incredibly happy and incredibly sad at the same time.  
"It was taken on the day I got accepted into La Scala. I was eleven. The school was too far away for me to drive there every day, so I boarded; they gave me this picture as a memento," Antonio explained from where he stood behind him, his voice sombre. Wolfgang hadn't intended to remind him of his parents and to make him sad when he had asked to see the picture.  
"I'm sorry. You look happy."  
"I was." At the look Wolfgang gave him at that, he elaborated. "I wasn't for quite some time after. It's better now. Especially since you've come into my life."  
Wolfgang went on his tippy-toes then to throw his arms around Antonio's neck and hug him. That was also the vantage point from where he saw the rest of the room.  
" _Oh my god you've got a canopy bed,"_ he whisper-screamed and, in a bid to lighten the mood, started walking the both of them towards it so that they could fall on top of it, Antonio grunting when the smaller man landed on him. Merciful as he was, he rolled off his boyfriend to have a closer look at the semi see-through black curtains, leaning partly over the edge of the bed. That was also when he saw the corner of a box peeking out from underneath it.

Curious as he was, he pulled it out from under the bed and lifted its lid, now hovering in the air torso-upwards so that he had it easier to grab for it.

Inside were newspaper cut-outs. The one at the very top dated more than a year back, showing Antonio in the role of Prince Désiré from _The Sleeping Beauty_. Wolfgang skimmed the article quickly before moving to the next one, which was slightly smaller and about the _A Midsummer Night's Dream_ ballet. Like this, he spent a few moments just leafing through the cut-outs while Antonio lay still behind him, before one finally made him laugh. It was an awkwardly staged photo of adolescent Antonio and a somehow younger Rosenberg, shaking hands and looking into the camera with awkward, forced smiles.  
"What?"  
"Look at your pimples and this cute little attempt of a beard! You're adorable!" Wolfgang gushed, already reaching for the phone in his pocket so that he could take a picture.

"You imp! Who gave you permission to be so nosy?"  
"What, as if you didn't hear m-" But he didnt get to finish, as Antonio suddenly grabbed him around his midst and dragged him back so that he was now lying on the bed again fully, his boyfriend above him.   
"My, Antonio, how-" Again he was interrupted, but this time it was because Antonio startled tickling him; on his stomach, the neck, the arms, he didn't stop at anything until he had Wolfgang winding from laughter beneath him, begging to stop. Only then did he cease.  
"Learned your lesson?"  
His only answer was Wolfgang fighting back, expertly seeking out the most ticklish spots with an accuracy that could only be gained from having had tickle-fights with your sibling for years.

Like that they squirmed around the bed, each of them taking and serving as much as they got, until they ended up with their heads at the foot-end of the bed, stomachs aching from laughter and with tears in the corners of their eyes.  
"Okay! Okay, I surrender," Wolfgang finally conceded and let himself go slack beneath his boyfriend. They took some time to catch their breath, and then, not unexpectedly, he was kissed.

His hands immediately went towards where Antonio's hair was already hanging open to cradle his neck and he readily opened his mouth when Antonio prodded at his lips with his tongue.They went about it a bit too over-enthusiastically at first, accidentally clashing their teeth together before adjusting their tempo, but then it was _heaven_. A few moments, minutes, whatever, went by with them just lazily swirling their tongues around each other, before they had to break apart to take a breath. That's when the mood shifted. For Antonio suddenly grabbed for Wolfgang's hands, which where still tangled in his hair, before pressing them into the bed and himself closer to the blond. The kiss that followed was almost too much yet it made Wolfgang's toes curl; it felt bruising and Antonio left no inch unexplored, encircling his tongue, brushing against the roof of his mouth, sucking his bottom lips between his own, _biting it_. It was like he was fucking Wolfgang's mouth with his tongue – and wasn't _that_ a thought – and then he chose exactly that moment to slide a thigh between Wolfgang's legs and _pressed down_.

The keening moan that left him seemed to surprise them both as Antonio suddenly broke off him, his own lips red and saliva-covered, staring at Wolfgang with wide eyes.  
"Is this okay?" he whispered, and was met with immediate sharp nodding.  
"Yes _please_."  
It took another whine from him to get Antonio to move again, pressing their lips together anew and holding his leg steady as Wolfgang made small circling emotions against it, but it wasn't _enough_.  
"Let me take off our shirts," Wolfgang prompted and immediately grabbed down to pull his t-shirt over his head once Antonio released his hands, watching impatiently as Antonio did the same. As soon as there was enough skin visible to touch, he let his hands roam free, gliding over those abs he had been fantasising about for literal months. The ring-necklace landed on his chest as Antonio bent forward again and moved his hands towards the fly of Wolfgang's trousers.

If Wolfgang hadn't been so turned on, he might've admired how calm and steady Antonio's fingers were even in the situation they were in. Unfortunately for them both, though, he became even more impatient instead and by the time Antonio finally managed to push both his trousers and pants down he was already squirming.  
" _Finally_."  
"It's not like it's my fault that you only choose jeans five sizes too small for you."  
"Don't pretend that you don't like th- _Ahh,"_ he cried out when, all of a sudden, Antonio grabbed for his dick and let his thumb swirl around the glistening head. "You asshole, why do you keep interrupting me today!"

Antonio chuckled.   
"Don't chuckle at me, you prick..," Wolfgang complained, yet he knew he couldn't sound serious, as much as his breath kept hitching. Antonio did an especially clever flick with his hand and it took all of his willpower to hold back the load moan that was bubbling up inside of him. "And you still have your trousers on, that's not fair, come on ..."  
The man must've taken pity on him, for just a moment later they were both stark naked; the sight of Antonio alone made Wolfgang want to bend over.

"Oh _fuck me_ ," he groaned, his boyfriend's awkward chuckle answering him. "No, seriously, please do."  
"As much as I'd like to, my prince, you've got to dance tomorrow and I don't have any condoms."  
Somewhere in the back of his mind, the endearment Antonio used got stored away, but for now Wolfgang had a one-track mind. " _Fine_ then. Do you have any lube?"  
Antonio didn't give an answer to this, instead leaning back so that he could dig around his nightstand. When he turned back around, he held a small bottle in his hand, nearly unused.

Without much fanfare, Wolfgang took it from him and squirted a good amount on his hand so that he could lube up Antonio's dick (And so what if he gave it a few extra strokes? The other man actually looked incredibly adorable the way he frowned slightly in an attempt to hold back embarrassing reactions.) before lubing up the insides of his thighs too for good measure and turned around onto his hands and knees, legs pressed together so that there was barely a gap.

"Like this," he instructed. A few seconds went by without anything happening, and he was expecting Antonio to just use his legs as instructed, but instead he felt his large hands on his butt first. They caressed the slight curve, before slightly pulling his cheeks apart.

He swore he could hear Antonio whisper a soft 'Someday' but before he could react the hands where off him and instead, Antonio guided his dick between Wolfgang's thighs. It rubbed against his balls so good, making him half cry out. This time, Antonio didn't take his sweet time, instead immediately going over into a rhythm that had Wolfgang shaking in milliseconds. Feeling the man's hard length rub between his soft thighs, and seeing it go back and forth between them, was arousingly obscene and Wolfgang couldn't keep his eyes off it from where he let his head hang between his arms. Nevermind that he could barely keep his eyes open with how Antonio kept gliding against his balls on every other thrust or so. Some time went by, just how much he didn't know, and he had let himself fall down to his forearms by now; one of his boyfriend's hands was holding his hip steady and, finally, his other reached down to jerk Wolfgang off.  
Their breathing was heavy and they didn't talk, except for calling out some obscenities, until finally Wolfgang hit his high into Antonio's fist, with the other man following soon after.

Shortly after Wolfgang let himself fall again, Antonio collapsing next to him too and they spent some time just lying there, catching their breath.

"I'm sorry," the other eventually spoke up, voice coarse.

"What are you saying sorry for?" Wolfgang whispered back, reaching for Antonio's hand.

"I probably shouldn't have pounced on you so early. We've been together for such a little time ..."  
"Firstly, you didn't _pounce_ on me. Secondly, who cares when we have which milestones in our relationship. It's not like there's a manual, or like our personal life is being monitored. _Thirdly_ , I very much liked it and you are therefore obligated to not feel any guilt."  
Antonio nodded, not saying anything yet still squeezing his hand back.

"Also, did you call me your _prince_? How adorable, you old-fashioned sap-"  
"Do you not like it?" Antonio muttered, eyes earnest.

Wolfgang's teasing face softened. "I love it, in fact."  
  


  
It was a bit later, both of them cleaned up and now the right way around on the bed, and Antonio already fast asleep. Wolfgang was about to turn over to switch off the small lamp on the nightstand, when his eyes fell on that box again that was still on the ground as he had left it before Antonio ambushed him. Thinking _why not_ he leaned down again and began to look through the snippets he had not yet leafed through, watching as Antonio grew younger and younger in the pictures, the paper grew more yellow sheet by sheet and as the language switched from German to Italian. He was smiling softly through all of it, until he came to the last cut-out at the bottom at the box.

This one didn't show Antonio at all, but instead displayed two photographs underneath a boldly printed headline in Italian. He recognised the two people in the right one to be Antonio's parents.

The left one showed a burning building.

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> If you wish to skip the explicit scene, please stop reading at "His hands immediately went towards where Antonio's hair was already hanging open [...]" and skip to "I'm sorry," the other eventually spoke up, voice coarse."
> 
> Thanks for reading, feedback as always greatly appreciated. 
> 
> Come chat with me on tumblr or twitter!


	13. Ouvert

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sorry it took me so long to upload this; the last few weeks have been busy.  
> I've uploaded a Steponte side-OS, called "Attitude". Check it out!
> 
> Now, have fun reading ~

A few days had gone by, bringing with them the arrival of the press call performance. Wolfgang didn't feel even a bit nervous, although it was his first performance as a principal dancer of a state ballet. Maybe it was because he would share the stage with his sister, boyfriend, and so many other amazing dancers that he could now call his friends. He was in safe hands, and he had practised hard, and they would do well.

"Break a leg!" Hannes said to him as he power-walked by Wolfgang, who was slowly making his way to the changing room so that he could get ready for the communal warm-up session. Grinning, he shouted back. "No thanks, I'm already in the cast!"

He couldn't hear the other man's reply, as Rosenberg's call of ' _No shouting in the halls!'_ behind him drowned it out. His grin grew wider.

Today would be a good day.

 

 

The whole male ensemble of Swan Lake was getting ready, not just the principal dancers as he was used to, but also the soloists and the few male corps; he knew many of them so he kept chatting back and forth across the room all while sharing a few joking comments with Antonio. After he had posted all those pictures on Instagram, basically the whole company knew of their relationship. They hadn't gotten any bad comments, thank god, the only reaction was a sour face by Rosenberg the day after but that didn't deviate too much from normally so he didn't care. Antonio had taken to wearing his ring necklace above his clothes more often, too, merely smiling at any attempts their friends made to find out why he was wearing a _plastic ring_ around his neck. And it didn't even take Nannerl prompting him for Wolfgang to set a sappy ringtone for Antonio. All in all, he was happy.  
They were happy.

The air in the big room all of them were warming up in was light, everyone in a good mood to finally see their hard work come to fruition. While they had already had their dress rehearsal, this would be the first time they'd perform in front of an audience, even if it was only the press and some special guests. Even Cavalieri and Rosenberg were in a good mood, yet not any less strict than usual lest the ensemble fucked up the show that would have reporters write about them.

They were only putting on normal workout clothes for now, the actual costumes and stage make-up wouldn't be donned until after the ensemble-wide class. Slowly, danseur after danseur, they began to trickle out of the room and into the big hall with barres all along its length and chose a place to already begin with their own personal stretches. This hall was usually used for the corps de ballet morning class, and training of big groups, but this was the first time Wolfgang used it. He and Antonio chose the same stretch of barre, just on opposing sides since it wasn't attached to a wall, and not long after Nannerl, Constanze and Aloysia joined them too. They talked a bit while stretching, their voices lost in the general chatter of the hall, before Cavalieri and Rosenberg called all of them to attention and began the daily routine. One hour of the same sequences repeated over and over went by, followed by a short speech by each of their instructors, and off to putting on costumes they were.

The male ensemble was done quickly – their costumes being simpler than that of the danseuses and their stage make-up minimal – yet Antonio and Hannes took a bit longer than them so that Wolfgang just sat around in boredom for a little while. When they came out, Hannes' hair was masterfully gelled back while Antonio's, having been in a bun before, now fell down to his shoulders in soft waves.

"Won't open hair disturb you while you dance?" Wolfgang greeted him.

"I've got about two cans of hairspray on, if even one strand of hair is out of place later I'll be immensely disappointed."

As soon as Wolfgang heard the word 'hairspray' he curiously led a finger to his boyfriend's locks, which, yea, weren't as soft as they looked. He hummed, curiosity satisfied.

"Hey, Hannes, can I try on your cape?"

"For the last time, I feel so silly when you call it that-"

He still let him try it on; where it barely skimmed the floor when Hannes was wearing it, it was dragging behind Wolfgang as he strutted up and down the little area they occupied.  
"Cool! I've never danced a character that wore a cape."  
"Well you don't dance _with_ the cape anyway."

"Semantics. Oh hey – Nannerl!" he called out to his sister, who he had just seen emerge from a door down the hall. Behind her, Constanze and Aloysia stepped out of the room and, together, they made their way over. It was the first time he was seeing Aloysia's Queen Mother gown, made out of light fabrics as to not drag her down while dancing, whereas the swans' dramatic eye make-up with slight variations was a familiar sight to him. He had seen his sister as a corps swan before, so he didn't pay the swan crown on her head much attention, yet as a whole she looked _amazing_ and that just made him dizzy.

"Look at you!" he whooped once she was only a few feet away from him and started running towards her, lifting her up by the hips in his joy. Once he sat her back down, he turned around to Constanze and held his hand out for her to take, leading it above her head so she could do a small pirouette and show off her costume. Then, he turned around to Aloysia and put on a jokingly serious face.  
"My queen," he deadpanned.

"Haha."

She smiled at him. He smiled back.

Her face had been made-up to look older, more frowny, so the smile looked like some kind of grimace. It made him grin even wider, something that persisted as they returned to Hannes and Antonio, and as he stood in front of his boyfriend in an open invitation to be hugged from behind.

They chatted a bit, Nannerl getting out a big box with an assortment of pine and walnuts and some carrot pieces for all of them at one point to give them energy for the performance, until Rosenberg and Cavalieri turned up at the hall, dressed in a suit and a beautiful long dress, respectively.

"All dancers appearing in the first act to the backstage!" Rosenberg called out and herded them through the door leading there. They could already hear chatter from the auditorium, though they couldn't see anyone from where they took their place offstage because the curtain was still let down. Once their instructors were sure that everyone was set, they walked onto the stage, each with a microphone in hand, and motioned for the curtain to be lifted.

The chatter immediately died, replaced with thunderous clapping and the flashes of several cameras

going off at the reveal of the company's ballet master and mistress, and of the set design.

"Hey," Antonio whispered from beside him. "Before I don't get any chance to do it later-" he pressed a soft good-luck kiss to Wolfgang's lips. Next to them, a flash went off, and they broke apart.

"Do you have a sixth sense of when to get out your phone to take pictures or what?" he asked but not in ill will as he stepped in next to his sister to take a glance of the picture. It looked pretty, with the well-lit stage behind them, their heads covering their instructors, and the dimness of the offstage around them.

"Do you mind if I post that?" she asked, looking more at Antonio than at him, who shrugged his shoulders and gave a short nod. Wolfgang could see her typing _'Benno kissing his prince good luck'_ before he moved back over to his boyfriend to press another short peck to his lips.

"Good luck to you too."

They listened to the little speech Rosenberg and Cavalieri were giving then, out of respect, and then it was showtime.

 

~*~

 

They took their bows to the applauding house. Once again, everything had gone well – there might have been an over-rotation here, and a less than perfect turnout there, but all in all they were happy. Wolfgang and his sister shone bright as always, and Salieri knew the reviews would be good and in their favour; they really had showed Vienna that they belonged here today.

The changing room was loud in the ensemble's elation, only interrupted by Rosenberg suddenly coming in and calling out to Wolfgang and him. "You two! You're giving interviews after this. Mozart, you'll meet up with your sister and Miss Weber in room 103 for a small round with different magazines. Salieri, you're having a one-on-one in the next room over. Madame Cavalieri and I are giving a press conference on the stage so we won't be with you. _Which means_ that you should behave and represent our company well. You're free to go afterwards."

They gave affirmative nods and then he was gone already, with an aftertaste of Hannes patting their backs too forcefully and wishing them good luck.

"We're giving interviews?" Wolfgang asked him, wide-eyed.

"Of course. We may not be the Bolschoi, but we're still a state ballet. And as long as there's still balletomanes in this world, they will want to read about us. And you three are the new, young principles so of course they want to see what you're like."

Once changed, they made their way over to the rooms they were told, Nannerl and Constanze already waiting in front of them.  
"I'll probably be done before you but I'll wait for you. Okay?"  
"Sure," Wolfgang answered and smiled reassuringly, before they parted ways and went into the separate rooms.  
The face he was met with was familiar; a woman about twice his age was sitting at the table in the middle of the room, standing up once he entered – the lead ballet reporter for Vienna's biggest culture newspaper whom he had had quite a few interviews with since arriving at the company.

"Mrs Graf," he greeted her, "pleasure to see you again. Shouldn't you be next door with our new principals?"

"I asked one my colleagues to jump in for me and wrote down some questions for him. You disappeared from the face of the earth so suddenly, I was worried. It's nice to see you up and dancing again. Amazing performance, by the way. One would think you never left." They shook hands and both sat down then. "Do you mind if I switch on my audio recording device?"  
"Not at all. Thank you for being worried."  
"That'd be my first question, actually – what was the reason for your disappearance?"  
For just a moment, Salieri thought about denying a proper answer, about saying that it was out of personal reasons and letting them wonder whether a family member had died or anything. Then he remembered the many times Wolfgang had comforted him and reassured him that his injury was nothing to be ashamed of, that admitting to it wouldn't put him at a disadvantage.  
"I've never actually openly talked about this, but … I had suffered a bad injury while practicing for a solo. It was very bad, required two surgeries, I was in the hospital for weeks. Recovery took ages and it wasn't clear if I'd ever be able to dance again, before the swelling went down and I was able to begin physical therapy. I only just returned at the beginning of this season." It helped that he knew, even liked, this reporter and that he trusted her in not making him look worse by twisting what he sad. Rosenberg was probably thinking the same, as there were probably more than one reporter wanting to interview him after his long break and this was the only one he allowed. "If you pay close attention, you can even still see my compression bandage underneath my tights. Dancing doesn't hurt anymore, but my knee is still more prone to injure so we're being cautious."  
Her professional facade didn't waver, yet he could see real compassion in her eyes.

"I'm sorry to hear that, and I'm sure that I'm not the only one who's happy to see you back. You probably know how incredibly fast tickets already began selling out once the cast got announced, without there even being ads or reviews out yet?"  
And from there on the interview commenced as usual, Salieri explaining his role anew – even though Mrs Graf knew his role very well every time she interviewed him, she always asked for his own thoughts on who he was portraying – the training process, some exclusive in-and-outs about the company and production, and much more.

While he seldom talked much, giving interviews felt comfortable; reporters very rarely asked about his personal life and more about his profession, which was info he was all too happy to give.

They wrapped up after about half an hour of talking, by the end of which they weren't really interviewing anymore but rather chatting, and even kissed each other's cheeks as a goodbye.

And then, he waited.

Having nothing better to do, he pulled out his phone and went to Nannerl's Instagram profile, where he downloaded and liked the picture she had taken of him and Wolfgang before the performance. After some consideration, he pulled up his own story-line and took a picture of the room Wolfgang was still giving interviews in, adding the caption _'Waiting for my prince to finish his audience.'_ followed by a sad smiley and a purple heart because people seemed to like it when he added emoticons. Another half an hour went by, and they really should be done soon, when he saw someone approaching out of the corner of his eye. It was Cavalieri, who had a nervous looking stranger who seemed to be younger than even Wolfgang trailing behind her.  
"Salieri! There you are. This is Miss Hannah Rainer, she asked for an interview with you and Mozart."  
"Hello, nice to meet you," the younger woman smiled and gave him a slightly shaky hand. "I thought I'd have no chance to ask to talk to you but then I saw the picture you posted on your Instagram story and went up to Madame Cavalieri after the press conference. I'm the writer of a LGBTQ+ culture blog, with my focus on ballet and theatre."  
"Monsieur Rosenberg was quite reluctant, but I think it's a good opportunity," Cavalieri explained further „Don't worry about bad publicity, I checked her blog and her writing seems to be positive and genuine“. Salieri didn't know what he thought about her being aware of his relationship with Wolfgang, and wanting to use it for some good representation publicity. He might've said no in any other situation, but the hopeful face of the young woman softened his resolve.  
"We should ask Wolfgang first," he gave in, rewarded with the biggest relieved smile by Miss Rainer.

"Very well. I'll leave you to it then – you can use the room you just had your interview with Mrs Graf in, Salieri. See you tomorrow." She shook his and Miss Rainer's hand before leaving them alone, now to wait together. Salieri asked her for the name of her blog, just so he could make sure that she was a serious blogger himself and wouldn't drag his and Wolfgang's name through the mud. He was met with a well-built website, a small picture and short info about her on the left and a big column with dated interviews, articles and reviews in the middle. Salieri skimmed through a few of them, satisfied with the way she talked about her subjects, until the door in front of them opened and a small crowd of reporters, followed by the three interviewees, came trickling out.

The latter looked quite exhausted, except for Wolfgang maybe who perked up at the sight of Salieri and the stranger beside him.

"Hey babe," Wolfgang greeted him and let himself fall against him, arms thrown around Salieri's neck. "Who's this?"  
"Miss Rainer. She's the writer for a LGBTQ+ blog and would like to interview us, as long as you're up for it."  
"Nice to meet you," she held her hand out towards Wolfgang. "But please call me Hannah."

Wolfgang smiled brightly at her, returning the handshake. "Of course I'd like to talk to you! And you can call us by our given names too."  
"Constanze and I'll go home already then," Nannerl chimed in from behind them. "Take care on your way home."  
Salieri did a short calculation in his head, figured out how long the interview might last and when Wolfgang would arrive at his home; if he were to come with him he could use the lateness as an excuse to sleep over. "I'll make sure he gets home safe. Now, I believe it'd be better to get on with the interview before it gets too late?"  
He accepted the hugs Nannerl and Constanze were giving him and Wolfgang, grabbed another chair from the room they had just come out and dragged it into the room he had his interview in, so that they could all sit down.

"So," Hannah began once that had happened, carding her fingers through her very short, brunette hair so that it was in even wider disarray than it had already been before. "I hope you don't mind if I record our conversation?"  
Two nods.  
"Okay, thank you. Let us begin then … I'd like to start with some info on yourselves, then about this new production of Swan Lake before we move over to some questions about your experiences in the world of ballet in general."

She waited for them both to nod their understanding again before segueing into the first set of questions.  
"The company website of the Vienna State Ballet has got fact files for all its dancers already, so we already know where the both of you were born, the milestones of your training and career, what awards you have won and which roles you've danced for the company. My first question would be how you two started dancing, any role models that inspired you?"  
Salieri looked at Wolfgang first, to gauge whether he should start first or not, and the blond shrugged his shoulders.  
"My mother has always been a connoisseur of the arts, so I came in contact with all kinds very early. I think the first time I encountered ballet was when I was around five years old, when we went to see the Nutcracker Suite for the very first time. From then on it was my obsession, and my mother was only too happy to indulge me. As for idols …," at this, he threw another side-glance at Wolfgang. "I actually am a big fan of Wolfgang's mother, though I didn't know that she was his mother at first since I only knew her by her maiden name. Then there's also Roberto Bolle, who is popular at La Scala, where I trained at very shortly, and Nureyev of course."

"I had been in contact with ballet from birth, what with my mother being a prima ballerina," Wolfgang took over. "By the time I could think, my sister Nannerl had already begun her own training, and - me being her personal little copycat – I wanted to start too. My idols are her and my mum; I admit that I don't really tend to idolise other dancers apart from those two."  
"Thank you. Antonio, you mentioned the period of nearly three years that you studied under La Scala – that is actually an interesting contrast between you two; Wolfgang coming from such a small ballet school and immediately being lifted to Principal Dancer at a state ballet, while you, Antonio, left such a prestigious school to continue your training at one of the lesser-known national companies. Any comments either of you would like to make?"  
Wolfgang, who knew about the fact that had it not been for the death of his parents Salieri would've happily continued at La Scala, jumped in to his rescue while Salieri was still sat still like a possum playing dead.  
"It's amazing! And we didn't even apply for it, so it came as a real shock – Nannerl and I are really active on social media, as you probably know, and the head of this company somehow stumbled upon us. We hadn't even thought of the possibility before that. When you grow up in a small community like that, you know, and you aren't encouraged to go to international competitions, moving to a bigger company isn't really at the forefront of your mind. We're both incredibly grateful for this opportunity, though, and the VSB is anything we could have ever dreamed of and more."

She waited a moment to see if either of them wanted to say more and when no one spoke up, she continued.

"As you've surely realised, I requested to interview you because of your relationship status, which you've made public online recently. Would you like to tell the readers something about your relationship?"  
At this, Wolfgang bloomed.  
"Alright, so it was my first day here, right? And I was really giddy and nervous, and in walks _this_ gorgeous man, all tall, dark and handsome and just completely whips me off my feet. We don't actually talk for quite some time, until one day I went to get in some extra-training and happened upon him. We began talking, went on a walk, became friends. Had some difficulties and misunderstandings on the way, but eventually we finally got together after we had fallen out big. There's really nothing special about our relationship, and it's still very young, so. But Antonio is very dear to me." At this, he grabbed for Salieri's hand, making him smile.

"Wolfgang actually helped me a lot. You might know that I've been absent from the company for a year before returning for this season. I had gotten injured, and wasn't yet fully healed by the time I started again, mostly because I didn't take good care of myself. He helped me come to terms with it and improve."  
"I did know that, though I didn't know about your injury. I'm glad that Wolfgang helped you fully recover, both of your performances were breathtaking tonight. Which – should we continue with talking about the production? What changes were made that sets this production apart from others?"

"Well … We've only got one actor for Rothbart, instead of one for his human and one for his evil form, but two danseuses for Odette and Odile respectively. I actually like it better this way, this way it's not so in our faces that they look the exact same, implying that Siegfried really only falls in love with their looks, making it easy to replace Odette," Salieri explained. "Nannerl and Constanze are both beautiful women, but incredible dancers with their own style and personality. It's more palpable why he falls for both, and it feels more like a betrayal. At least that's how I see it, of course my opinion doesn't represent that of our superiors."

"Also some productions do some kind of prologue-ey backstory where they show how Rothbart puts his claws around Odette's fate, but we left that out. I actually had a talk with Madame Cavalieri about that; ballet usually is all about the ballerinas, but we wanted to push the focus, or point of view, more into my – Siegfried's – direction too. He doesn't know what has happened to her, so the audience does neither. He falls in love, the audience should too. He feels frustrated, we're trying to make the audience feel that too. It's difficult, but I try my best."  
Salieri squeezed his hand, meant as a short of reassurance. "We could also go into the ending a lot, but I'm sure you wouldn't want to spoil it? I'll only say that we put a lot of worth on redemption for our production. Ballet tends to see in black and white, we wanted the spectrum in between."

"Genius ending, by the way. I've seen many different renditions of Swan Lake, but never anything like this."  
"We'll pass the compliments on to the creative brains behind that." Wolfgang gave her a charming smile.

"Thank you," she smiled back. "Now, to the last segment – ballet in general. Specifically the prejudices and double-standards that exist inside the community."

"Oh honey, there's a lot," Wolfgang replied, leaning more into Salieri. "There's especially some elitism between classical and modern ballet, a whole lot to unpack with sexism in the industry, and don't even get me started on racism."

"Have either of you experienced any of these things?"

Salieri hasn't, but he knew Wolfgang did. He felt guilty about it, somehow – was he privileged?

"A lot, yes. Mostly from my father, though – he used to be a danseur but had to retire because of an injury, he was still very invested in my sister's and my schooling, though. We weren't allowed to try out modern ballet, or to have a look at other dance genres. That didn't stop us, of course, we often covered each other so that we could go out and take a wide array of classes. I love classical, of course, otherwise I wouldn't have taken on this profession. It's just … I know that for many people, ballet is perfection. It's gliding, it's etherealness, it's clear-cut. But to me, ballet is expression. It's telling a story through your body. But all the companies have got a clear type of how they want their dancers to look, and how they want them to move. Trying to mould the dancers until they all fit set forms is killing the art. Sure, smaller companies are more open and some state ones are slowly improving too, but if you take a look at the really big ones, like Bolschoi, there really is no dawn in sight." Wolfgang was talking so rapid-fire that Salieri was worried that her recorder wouldn't pick everything up. "Also sexuality is a tricky thing when you're a danseur. Because there's this stereotype that ballerinos are somehow inherently gay, the amount of times I've heard men and _boys_ being called gay just because they do ballet is frankly ridiculous, which is something every danseur experiences. Yet once there actually _is_ a gay danseur, there's a high chance he'll be discriminated against _inside_ the company and out. I kept my sexuality all hush-hush back in Salzburg, because I've seen other dancers experiencing that. Here it's better, we're not the only queer people in the company, and not the only couple either, so I knew it was safe."  
"Wow, that's a lot. Some of the other danseurs I've interviewed talked about the same things, I can't imagine what it must be like in less liberal countries. You mentioned your father, did he do anything else?"  
"Oh yea, _lots_ of things," Wolfgang sighed, now leaning his head on Salieri's shoulder. "I vividly remember the day Nannerl got her first pair of pointe shoes. She was twelve, I think, and she just looked so _graceful_ and I thought, as always, _'Wow, I want to be like her. I want to do that too'_ so I told her and my sister, she's always been very supportive of me, said yes of course. So I sneaked into her room at night and she let me try them on. I was much smaller than her, of course they were too big for me, so we stuffed them with paper and she showed me how to tie them and helped me go en pointe for the very first time. We must've giggled too loud or something, because suddenly our father came barging in and when he saw what we were doing, he was furious. He gave me the worst scolding I had ever gotten, and locked all of Nannerl's pointe shoes and tutus away from then on."  
Wolfgang had told him this story before, and he knew how much it upset him, yet his boyfriend was recounting his experiences willingly and so all he could do was comfort him.

"My sister and I also loved to watch videos of big productions, and to try to dance the solos in them. And, _god_ , he got so mad everytime he recognised me dancing a female part, or vice versa for Nannerl. We really hid a lot from him, now that I think of it. I'm glad we're out of his reach."  
At this, he let out a yawn.  
"Oh! It's late already and you two must be exhausted," Hannah apologised, scrambling to turn the recorder off once she had made sure that neither of them wanted to say anything else. "Thank you _so much_ for letting me interview you, it really means a lot."

"What's your Instagram? I'll follow you so that you can DM me. Please do, whether it's because you've got any more questions or because you just want to chat, I don't care," Wolfgang smiled at her, slowly righting himself again so he was sitting properly. "Thanks for having us."  
They shook hands and parted ways after that, Salieri calling a taxi for Wolfgang and himself because neither of them had the energy to actually walk to Wolfgang's flat; something that was proven by his boyfriend falling asleep against his shoulder only a second after they had sat down, the energy he had displayed only an hour ago suddenly drained from him.  
Salieri looked down at him, at his soft expression and the way the city lights danced across his form.

He really did love him.

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I hope you liked it!  
> Comments and Kudos as always much appreciated~


	14. Fermé

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Here it is - the last chapter.  
> Thank you so much for going on this journey with me; I've never written such a long fanfiction before, much less finished a multi-chaptered one, and a lot happened during the writing process. I'll hold it dear to my heart for a long time, and I hope you will too.  
> See you at the end - enjoy!
> 
> **Terms for this chapter:**  
>  Principal dancer - dancers at the highest rank within a professional dance company, who regularly perform not only solos, but also pas de deux. It is a coveted position in the company and the most prominent position a dancer can receive.  
> Corps de ballet - all the dancers who dance nameless roles without any solos. For example all the swans in Swan Lake.  
> Pas de trois - dance / choreography for three dancers.  
> Pas de deux - dance / choreography for two dancers.

The sun stood high in the sky, beating hot on their shoulders with its heavy rays and making the wait for the inevitable even more unbearable.

Trains had been clacking by where he and Antonio stood for what felt like ages, yet none of them were the one he was dreading. His boyfriend was holding his hand in comfort, comfort to them both as neither of them liked the reason they were at Vienna Central Station that much. A woman's voice announced the next train over the speakers, and he knew that this was the one.  
"That's it, then," Wolfgang murmured, clutching Antonio's hand tighter.  
"You know I'm here for you, no matter what happens," he whispered back and pressed a soft kiss to Wolfgang's temple. Despite the uncomfortable feeling in his stomach, Wolfgang managed a small smile. "I know."  
The train rolled by, coming to an eventual stop, and – his heart dropping so fast it hurt – Wolfgang let Antonio's hand fall, not without missing it immediately.

"Hey, it's not for long," Antonio immediately tried to reassure him.  
"It will feel like an eternity to me."  
Antonio obviously wanted to say something else, but just in that moment the train's doors opened and Wolfgang was already stepping closer.  
His eyes searched the platform's edge, restlessly, until finally he saw what he was looking for. His mother, wearing a summer-dress that just barely matched her beauty, had stepped out of the compartment and with bated breath he looked for his father to come up behind her. But nothing of the sort happened, his mother catching sight of him and making her way over without seeming to wait for anybody else, and a strange mixture of both relief and disappointment welled up in him.

"Wolfgang, my dear!" she greeted him as soon as he was in ear-shot, and once he was in reach too she pulled him into a hug.

"Hello mamá." He returned the hug twice as strong. "Where's father?"  
"Oh honey … why don't I tell you on the way home? Is your sister here?"  
"She had to go to she shoe-making department of our company today, so she couldn't come. She said she precooked lunch for us, though, and that she'd join us as soon as she could."

"And what about that handsome boyfriend of yours?" At this, she took some distance from him (yet not letting go of her soft grip on him) to have a look around the platform. He turned around to either point him out to her, or to give him a wave to show that he should join them, but had to laugh when he saw just how rigidly Antonio was standing.

"Oh my," his mother chuckled. "What a prim-and-proper little ballerino. Is he nervous to meet me?"  
"He's probably shitting his pants right now," he chuckled and turned around to her. "He really likes you from when you weren't retired yet. You being his boyfriend's mother probably doesn't make it any better."

Mischief lit up her eyes, reminding him again of where Nannerl and he had gotten big parts of their personalities from, and made him feel schadenfreude to see how the two would interact. His mother's training would of course keep her from being anything but graceful and polite, but that had never kept her from teasing other people.

"Let's make our way over then."  
The closer they got, the higher Antonio's shoulders were drawn up and the more nervous he looked.

Being no more than a few feet away, he finally walked towards them and held out a hand so stiff it could as well have been a piece of wood. "It's an honour to meet you, Madame Pertl."  
Instead of taking his hand she held out her own one and watched amusedly as he scrambled to take it and place a kiss an inch above it. "Pleasure. Antonio Salieri, right? Former La Scala, Viennese danseur for about a decade?"  
He let go of her hand, returning to his awkward stance, and threw a nervous glance towards Wolfgang who couldn't hold back a smile.  
"Yes, ma'am. How do you ..?"  
At this she finally gave him a true smile, letting go of her teasing, and put a hand on his shoulder.  
"No need to be so nervous, dear. Of course I know about you, you're my son's first boyfriend that he didn't try to hide from us! Besides, there was a lot of info on you in those articles Wolfgang has sent me." He relaxed a bit, obviously forcing himself to, and she let her hand slide off. "Also, please call me Anna, or Anna-Maria, whichever you like more. Now, let's get moving and you can tell me more on the way?"

They did just that, taking their time to walk home instead of taking public transit or a cab so that his mother could enjoy the city a bit, and talking about anything that came to mind. What first came up was their articles – Wolfgang had taken pictures of the ones in newspapers for her and even sent her the one that one blogger published, which had given them a strong influx of new followers and positive feedback. Once the cut-out of Antonio's interview had appeared in his box he had sent her that too, just for good measure.

"I wish you hadn't mentioned your father like that, though. I know his means aren't ideal, but he only means good," came the only complaint from his mother.  
He could hear Antonio huff and murmur a quiet _'Sure he does.'_ from his other side, but didn't react to that.  
"Why didn't he come, mamá? I sent you two tickets, didn't I?"  
"He .. isn't the most pleased with you at the moment, and as much as I tried to convince him to come and at least watch it, he just wouldn't give in. I'm sure he'll come next time, though – and I wanted to give the second ticket back to you, but he threw it away before I could rescue it. I really am sorry, dear."

He was fighting for words, his sadness caught up like a lump in his throat, but Antonio grabbing for his hands gave him strength.  
"Tell him it's a pity that he doesn't want to be here. I'm still glad that you are."  
  


 

They had lunch at their flat, catching up on each other's lives, talking about what to do during the two days that his mother would stay in Vienna, until Nannerl came home with the message that they all were invited to a dinner celebration some of the other dancers were holding.  
"Nannerl, mother is here, we surely can't just-"  
"I'd love to join you," their mother interrupted him. "If that's alright with your friends, I mean; I'd like to meet them too."  
And that's how they ended up in Hannes' father's pub again, at the biggest table they had with all other principal dancers and some soloists and corps thrown in. At first, Wolfgang had worried about how their mother would like the place, but she fit right in, accepting the adoration and compliments the other dancers shouted after recognising her in stride, conversing with them and even ordering a beer to clink glasses with them.

Constanze and Aloysia arrived shortly after them, the latter holding the hand of a man Wolfgang didn't know.

"You look like Stephanie!" Hannes had called out, slapping Stephanie's shoulder in emphasis (who was occupied with being gross with Lorenzo and paid him no mind) before recalling his manners and introducing them all. The doppelganger turned out to be Aloysia's fiancé, not Stephanie's long-lost twin, Aloysia having finally decided to open up a bit to them.

The more time went by, the more Antonio relaxed in his mother's presence, until eventually reaching the obligatory point at which she told him all kinds of embarrassing stories about her only son and he soaked them up like a sponge, occasionally cooing and teasing Wolfgang.

The evening went by amicably, all of them happy with their hard work and looking forward to their first public performance that would take place the day after, sharing more funny and cringe-worthy stories about past productions, enchantedly listening to Nannerl's and his mother – who was the only one of them who had truly performed all over the world – and talking about the changes that had been made for their production.

Once it got too late, they parted ways from the group and brought their mother to the hotel she had booked (as much as they would've liked having her sleep in their flat, they didn't have a guest room and offering her the couch was unacceptable) before parting ways with Antonio.

They didn't see their mother the next day, what with her wanting to go spend some time in the city alone since she didn't want them to be foot-dead even before their Vienna premiere. So instead, Nannerl and he took it easy before heading to the venue for the production-wide warm-up and class.

It was strangely quiet, as if everyone was caught in their own little headspace, only following Rosenberg's instructions by habit and as in a trance. The changing rooms were a bit better, some chatter breaking through the general quiet. Wolfgang himself felt as if he could burst, wanting nothing more than to chit-chatter as usual, but even Antonio seemed to be lost in his own little world in contrast to his usual attunement to Wolfgang. It was Hannes that saved him in the end, blasting the bubble the room was in with a loud exclamation.  
"I can't take this any- guys! Why are you all so solemn? Just yesterday we were toasting and boasting, and now you're all walking around with your tails between your legs. A bit more cheer please, we'll do amazing, and all of you know that." Nobody answered him but he wasn't swayed, taking the smiles that had slid onto some of their faces as encouragement. "So chins up, let's give them the best performance anyone could hope for. Close your ears to Rosenberg's complaints and open your hearts to the audience. I'm out."

And then he left – not the first one to be finished dressing, but the first one whose departure was noticed. He wasn't there to see it, but his little speech had had its effect, the ambience having picked up. Even Antonio gave him a grin in its wake, and together they finished dressing up and putting stage makeup on. Antonio went to take care of his hair after, leaving Wolfgang to wait for him, which gave him a limited amount of time to scramble back into the changing room to retrieve something he had hidden there earlier in the day.

Trying to look inconspicuous, even with what he was holding in his hands, he went back to where he was waiting for Antonio and continued to do so.

The other danseur's eyebrows shot up the moment he stepped out of the room and saw what Wolfgang was holding.  
"What's that?" he asked immediately.

"Just open it." Wolfgang gave it to him; the gift was big enough that Antonio had to lay it down on the floor to unwrap it without risk of damaging it. They were pulling quite some attention to them but neither of them cared.

Without any preamble, Antonio tore the hot pink wrapping paper off. His eyes widened.  
"Wolfgang-," he murmured, picking up the smaller picture frame on top. It held a photo of them both, Wolfgang's favourite from the day they had taken what felt like hundreds of pictures. Antonio looked soft in it, happy, his hold on Wolfgang gentle, who in turn smiled contently instead of showcasing his usual placating grin. From underneath it, an even bigger collage of many photos got revealed, over three feet in length and about half as wide. He had made it from some more pictures of them both, a few that were taken without either of them noticing and that he could only acquire by pressing their friends for them, and even more that he had taken of Antonio while he was occupied with their friends.  
"You are not alone anymore, Antonio. I – I want to give you this, to remind you of that." Wolfgang explained, having let himself drop to his knees so that he was on eye-level with Antonio. "It's not only me that's here for you. There's a lot of people that like and love you, and these photos will remind you of that everytime you look at them."  
Hands shaking, Antonio put the smaller frame down again, and immediately after threw his arms around him.  
"Thank you so much," he whispered into his ear.

"I love you."

 

 

The ensemble was giving each other good-luck hugs backstage, the general mumbling of the audience and the soft playing of the orchestra reaching their ears. Rosenberg and Cavalieri were hustling around, making sure that everyone was ready to go once the curtains lifted and, once the last stragglers had been put in their place, gave the command for everything to start.  
The red drapes lifted up ever-so-heavily, giving way to a grand view of a full house, and Wolfgang could even see his mother from where he stood, still backstage.

He had gotten her tickets just a few rows away from the stage, close enough that he could see her smile. Close enough to see that the seat beside her was empty.

The music started, introducing the opening scene of a grand ball in honour of prince Siegfried's birthday. The corps and soloists that embodied the guests entered the stage, followed by Antonio who, true to his role as Benno, entertained them and lifted the mood. After some prancing around, he called them to attention and, once he had it, mentioned towards a staircase – Wolfgang's clue to enter the stage.

He held his hand up in greeting, met with applause from the audience, and went down the steps to join the other dancers. Rosenberg had taught him to shake Benno's hand once there, but instead he laid his hands on the other man's shoulders and smiled at him. Antonio drew up an eyebrow, his back to the audience, and smiled back.

Corps began dancing around them then, putting the party into swing, and prompted them to join in. They kept at it until, a few minutes in, Aloysia in her role as Queen Mother appeared at the top of the staircase, everyone bowing to her.

She gave Siegfried his gift of a crossbow, as usual, and the prop weapon felt ridiculously light and large in his hands as always while he pranced around and showed it off to the other dancers. Aloysia called him back to her, then, and acted out that she wanted Siegfried to marry. Something in him jostled, then; a reminder of all the times he had been told to do something he didn't want, with no choice but to agree, and he didn't have to act out his indignation after.

Antonio threw him a worried glance once he had his back to the audience again, recognising immediately that this wasn't acting, but having no choice but to keep going he went on with his _pas de trois_ and the following solo. Seeing his boyfriend dance so well really _did_ cheer him up, as was the intended effect for Siegfried.

The first act went by. A changed background – Siegfried on a night-time hunt as suggested by Benno to cheer him up – and the first entry of Odette, his sister met with big applause.

She was as beautiful as always, if not more, bathed in ethereal light and accompanied by the soft title music of _Swan Lake_ , and as they danced on Wolfgang kept catching glimpses of Hannes' – von Rothbart's – evil form. Immersed in his role as he was, he grew furious. He loved her so dearly, admired her so much, but her wings had been clipped by people who couldn't bear seeing her fly off. They had moulded her, made her into something she wasn't quite, and called it love.

He wouldn't allow it anymore, for he wanted to see her _soar_.

 

 

~*~

 

 

Wolfgang was on fire. He was usually a force to be reckoned with, all perfect grace, heartfelt movements, and stone-hard strength when called. But this – this was him on his absolute peak; Salieri watched in amazement how vulnerable and loving his prince was as he danced with his sister, and how furious he turned at the act's end when von Rothbart fully revealed himself and how Odette's fate was in his hands. As Salieri didn't have to be on the stage after he left in the beginning of act two, he had been waiting at its sides since then (Constanze next to him), with bottles of water ready for the siblings. The curtains fell, applause reaching their ears even through the heavy material, and Wolfgang and Nannerl came walking over to them, both breathing heavily and bodies glistening with sweat. They both had a slightly shell-shocked expression, as if they themselves couldn't believe how well they'd done, and only accepted the hugs from Salieri and Constanze as in a daze. Only when the bottles of water were held out in front of them did they snap out of it, chatting at each other excitedly, barely listening to what the other said in an attempt to make their own compliments heard. He and Constanze didn't even attempt keeping them from it, instead pushing them to sit down and do some stretches lest they injure themselves in their intermission.

Salieri contended himself with pressing a short kiss to his boyfriend's head and listening to his rambling until the signal was given for the second half of the ballet to commence.

Wolfgang broke off at that, sending Nannerl a look as if to say ' _I'll keep gushing at you later'_ and let himself be dragged back to the stage by Salieri. The two girls stayed behind, both of them only appearing later in act three.

Staging-wise, the third act had returned to the setting of the big ballroom that had already been used at the beginning of the ballet, showing the grand ball at which Siegfried was meant to choose his bride.

Salieri was among the guests from the beginning, mingling and dancing, and only went to Wolfgang's side the moment Siegfried entered together with his mother, playing the ever loyal friend. Shoulder to shoulder they watched the dancing couples, until eventually the princesses from other nations entered, trying to entice the prince by their dancing.

_Hungarian dance_ , _Danse Espagnole_ , _Danse Napolitaine_ , _Mazurka_.

None of them good enough for prince Siegfried, yet he still entertained them with not even half as much passion as he had when he danced with his swan.  
Until _they_ entered.

Von Rothbart, in his imposing and regal human form, with Odile at his side; a sight to behold.

Immediately, Siegfried lit up at seeing her, mistaking her first for his swan but then recognising her as somebody else, yet just as beautiful. He was obviously torn, watching in tumult as she stayed in the background while von Rothbart captured first his mother's heart, and then everyone's in the ballroom. He gave way to his daughter, who would then have a _pas de deux_ with Prince Siegfried, who fell evermore in love with her, as if under a spell. Benno hovered in the background, throwing concerned glances, recoiling when all of a sudden, when the last note had rang, Siegfried asked for the stranger's hand with his mother's blessing.

A change of lighting, a change in music, the atmosphere turned sinister – von Rothbart revealed the illusion, reminded Siegfried of his swan whom he had forgotten about in his spell-bound state, her form dancing in despair in the background before disappearing.

Act three came to an end.

Von Rothbart and Odile gone, Siegfried fled to the lake, seeking out his love, yet he was not alone – Benno and some guards were following him, concerned for their prince.

Odette and her swan maidens were still there, all of them mourning for the only chance they had had to be freed of the spell that had been put on them. The evil sorcerer and his daughter were already waiting for them, him laughing at the young couple as they danced their last dance, but her just watching silently.

It was no question to Salieri whether Benno was in love with Siegfried, something that had been discussed time and time again over the years – it was a simple fact. In most renditions this fact had turned him to a jealous man, someone who would rather betray his love and see him unhappy than to see him be with the woman he loved, a love that he couldn't have himself. Not this time, though, no – sometimes loving someone didn't mean forcing your will on them, but neither did it to let them go – sometimes it could simply mean wanting them to be happy while still holding them close, accepting whatever type of love they could offer you. In a bid to see his love happy, Benno turned to Odile – who now looked solemn, as if she regretted what she had done.

_Look at them_ , he motioned, _how true their love is. Why would you want to ruin this, what do you gain from this? Have you never been in love? Do you not want to see them happy? This is destroying them._

At first, she looked in denial, but as he went on pleading her expression turned to resolve, and she turned to her father. Angrily at first, then in misery, she pleaded for him to leave the two lovers alone. Von Rothbart wouldn't listen at first, but the more his daughter broke down, the more his will wavered. What good were some enchanted girls to him if his own daughter was the price? What good would the enchanted princess do him if she died of her despair?

He caved in, breaking the proposal bond and the spell at the same time, watching as the young lovers fell into each other's arms in relief, and as his own daughter thanked him through tears. He and Odile disappeared, never to be seen again, but still remembered by the kingdom.

_After all, theirs was a story of redemption; of overcoming hardships through the help of others, of finding love where you thought none was left._

 

 

•

 

•

 

•

 

•

 

•

 

Months later, they have their last run of this season's _Swan Lake_. A full house greets them, and the air is light. In an homage to how Wolfgang had pulled him aside before their first performance together, Salieri now grabs him by the hand to pull him to the side so that they won't block the whole hallway. This is an end for them, somehow. To this part of their lives, at least – and neither of them know what the next seasons of their career will look like. But there is one thing he knows for sure.  
"I'm not alone anymore," Salieri begins. "You showed me that, and every day that I spend with you is a gift to me. If you'll allow me, I'd like to never again spend one without you."

His heart afloat, he goes down on one knee and pulls out a golden-banded ring with an embedded stone of the same colour as the plastic ring that is still around his neck.

"Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart," he proclaims, gazing up lovingly to where his boyfriend is staring at him in shock, hand over his mouth and tears in his eyes. "I've still got a wish to make. Will you marry me?"

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> (Wolfie nearly bitched about how Antonio technically didn't have a wish free afterwards, since he cheated, but just this once he let it slide.)
> 
> Thank you so much for reading, I hope you liked this as much as me. Maybe we will see each other again in a different story, maybe not, but my heart and love goes out to you all the same.  
> -R xo

**Author's Note:**

> Please come talk to me on Tumblr or Twitter! (Hakuryen on both)


End file.
